LIBRARY  OF  THE  THEOLOGICAL  SEMINARY 

PRINCETON,  N.  J. 


Purchased  by  the  Hamill  Missionary  Fund. 


Division . f. 


t+as'h- 


Section. 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2019  with  funding  from 
Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Library 


https://archive.org/details/newworldoflaborOOeddy 


THE  NEW  WORLD 


OF  LABOR 


BY 


APR  19  1924 

A 


v" 


SHERWOOD  EDDY 

Author  of  “Toeing  the  Crisis  99  “Everybody's  World,9*  etc . 


NEW 


YORK 


GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


COPYRIGHT,  1923, 

BY  GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR.  Ill 


PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Foreword  .  . . .  .  ...  .  .  .  vii 

CHAPTER 

I  Industrial  China . 13 

II  The  New  Japan . 37 

III  India’s  Industrial  Revolution . 60 

IV  The  Reconstruction  of  Russia . 81 

V  The  Evolution  of  Labor  in  the  West  .  .  .  109 

VI  The  British  Labor  Movement . 130 

VII  Labor  in  Europe . 149 

VIII  American  Labor  Problems . 174 

IX  The  Challenge  of  a  New  World  of  Labor  .  197 


FOREWORD 


On  the  present  trip  around  the  world  during  1922  and 
1923  the  writer  endeavored  to  make  a  study  of  the  indus¬ 
trial  situation  and  of  conditions  of  labor  in  the  principal 
countries  visited.  These  included  China,  Japan  and  India 
in  the  Far  East,  Germany  and  the  Ruhr,  France,  Italy  and 
Great  Britain  in  Europe,  and  finally  Russia  as  the  storm 
center  of  the  labor  world. 

However  we  may  interpret  the  fact,  the  war  seems  to 
have  marked  the  close  of  an  epoch.  Whether  for  better  or 
for  worse,  we  are  in  the  midst  of  a  period  that  will  witness 
the  birth  of  a  “New  World  of  Labor.”  In  order  to  make  a 
study  of  the  labor  situation  that  has  arisen  since  the  war, 
the  writer  sought  to  secure  an  industrial  expert  to  make  the 
investigation  but  failed  in  the  case  of  three  successive  men 
who  had  hoped  to  make  this  tour  of  inspection.  He  was 
finally  compelled  to  undertake  it  alone.  He  was  painfully 
conscious,  however,  of  not  being  technically  qualified  for 
such  a  task. 

Six  months  before  the  trip  was  undertaken  a  somewhat 
exhaustive  questionnaire  on  the  industrial  situation  was 
sent  in  advance  to  representatives  in  each  country,  and 
information  was  gathered  before  our  arrival.  During 
the  visit  we  endeavored  to  supplement  the  documentary 
evidence  by  inspection  of  factories,  interviews  with  gov¬ 
ernment  officials,  labor  leaders,  employers  and  others 
conversant  with  the  labor  situation. 

The  writer’s  thanks  are  due  to  many  friends  for  furnish¬ 
ing  industrial  information,  for  reading  portions  of  the 

•  • 

Vll 


Vlll 


FOREWORD 


manuscript  and  for  criticisms  and  suggestions,  especially  to 
Messrs.  A.  Friedman  on  Russia,  Thomas  Tchou  on  China, 
T.  Kagawa  on  Japan,  H.  A.  Popley  on  India,  J.  J.  Mallon, 
J.  S.  Middleton  and  E.  W.  Wimble  on  the  British  Labor 
Movement,  and  to  certain  others  whose  names  cannot  be 
mentioned  because  of  their  official  positions.  Also  to  Mr. 
J.  E.  Herbert  of  the  International  Labor  Office  in  London, 
and  to  the  Director  of  the  Labor  Office  at  the  League  of 
Nations  at  Geneva,  M.  Albert  Thomas,  for  the  use  of  the 
library  for  several  weeks.  The  writer  is  also  grateful  to 
Waldo  Stephens  for  his  generous  cooperation  and  to  Kirby 
Page,  E.  C.  Lindeman  and  Robert  Bruere  for  invaluable 
criticism  and  suggestion. 

Unless  otherwise  specified,  all  prices  and  wages  for  the 
various  countries  are  given  in  gold  dollars  and  cents. 

As  far  as  possible  we  have  endeavored  to  let  the  facts 
speak  for  themselves.  Where  views  are  expressed  they  are 
personal  and  unofficial  and  do  not  represent  those  of  any 
organization.  The  writer  has  no  axe  to  grind  and  no 
propaganda  to  further,  for  or  against  any  cause.  The 
truth  is  that  the  world  has  been  victimized  by  propaganda 
ever  since  1914.  It  is  quite  probable  that  in  the  light  of 
this,  the  facts  stated  in  certain  chapters,  as  on  Russia,  for 
instance,  may  not  be  in  accord  with  what  we  have  been 
told  in  the  daily  press.  For  those  who  have  eagerly  swal¬ 
lowed  whole  all  that  they  have  read,  or  all  that  has  been 
stated  by  those  who  have  been  dispossessed  of  their  privi¬ 
leges  under  the  Czarist  regime,  the  statements  concerning 
the  reconstruction  of  Russia  may  seem  untrue  or  unpal¬ 
atable.  Our  one  desire  has  been  to  tell  the  truth.  We 
might  run  the  war,  but  we  cannot  longer  run  the  world,  on 
propaganda.  No  problem  is  solved  by  simply  “seeing  red.” 
In  the  end  the  truth  will  out,  and  it  will  prevail  against  all 
fiction  and  falsehood. 


FOREWORD 


IX 


However  we  may  have  failed  in  our  aim,  the  purpose  of 
the  book  is  to  win  sympathy  for  the  toiling  masses  in  the 
new  world  of  labor.  No  student,  no  business  man,  certainly 
no  true  citizen  or  patriot,  or  professing  Christian;  no 
idealist  or  realist  concerned  with  the  conditions  or  needs  of 
his  fellow  men  can  be  indifferent  to  the  crucial  problem 
which  confronts  us  in  this  world  of  labor.  It  is  one  of  the 
four  major  problems  of  our  time — the  industrial  problem, 
the  international  problem,  the  interracial  problem,  and 
underlying  all  these,  the  question  of  whether  there  is  a 
moral  dynamic  and  spiritual  principle  and  power  adequate 
for  a  solution  of  these  problems,  or  whether  men  must  turn 
to  a  materialistic  interpretation  of  life  as  in  Russia  today — * 
these  are  the  great  issues  of  our  time. 

For  more  than  a  year  during  this  tour  we  have  seen  these 
men  in  the  factory  or  the  home  in  all  lands  doing  the 
world’s  work.  We  have  no  words  fine  enough  to  state  their 
case.  As  we  have  sat  with  them  on  the  floor  of  their 
poverty-stricken  homes  in  China,  Japan  or  India,  as  we 
have  observed  their  titanic  struggle  against  terrific  odds  in 
war,  revolution,  hunger  and  famine  in  Russia,  as  we  have 
followed  their  long  fight  against  low  wages,  long  hours  or 
adverse  conditions,  in  many  lands,  in  the  crowded  factory 
or  the  city  slum,  again  and  again  the  words  of  Robert  Louis 
Stevenson  have  recurred  to  us  on  this  journey:  “In  the 
slums  of  cities,  moving  amongst  indifferent  millions,  to 
mechanical  employments,  without  hope  of  change  in  the 
future,  with  scarce  a  pleasure  in  the  present,  and  yet  true 
to  his  virtues,  honest  up  to  his  lights,  kind  to  his  neighbors, 
tempted  perhaps  in  vain  by  the  bright  gin  palace  .  .  . 
often  repaying  the  world’s  scorn  with  service,  often  stand¬ 
ing  firm  upon  a  scruple  .  .  .  everywhere  some  virtue 
cherished  or  affected,  everywhere  some  decency  of  thought 
and  courage,  everywhere  the  eiisign  of  man’s  ineffectual 


X 


FOREWORD 


goodness — ah!  if  I  could  show  you  this!  If  I  could  show 
you  these  men  and  women  all  the  world  over,  in  every  stage 
of  history,  under  every  abuse  of  error,  under  every  circum¬ 
stance  of  failure,  without  hope,  without  help,  without 
thanks,  still  obscurely  fighting  the  lost  fight  of  virtue,  still 
clinging  to  some  rag  of  honor,  the  poor  jewel  of  their  souls.” 

New  York, 

October  8,  1923. 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


THE  NEW  WORLD 
OF  LABOR 


Chapter  I 

INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 

Asia  is  now  in  the  beginning  of  a  great  industrial  revo¬ 
lution.  Such  an  industrial  revolution  in  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  from  1760  to  1832,  gradually  trans¬ 
formed  rural  England  into  a  manufacturing  country.  In 
the  nineteenth  century  it  extended  over  Europe  and 
America.  In  the  twentieth  century  it  has  entered  the  Orient 
as  a  terrific  invasion. 

In  the  continent  of  Asia  there  are  some  five  hundred  and 
seventy  millions  gainfully  employed  in  cheap  labor,  more 
than  twice  the  number  in  Europe  and  America  combined. 
At  present  they  are  engaged  principally  in  agriculture  and 
home  industries,  but  India,  China  and  Japan  are  now  being 
rapidly  industrialized.  Are  they  to  become  the  sweatshop 
of  the  world,  exploiting  their  own  toiling  populations  and 
menacing  the  standard  of  living  in  the  West?  Or  can 
Asia,  avoiding  generations  of  oppression,  injustice  and  con¬ 
flict,  introduce  international  industrial  standards  for  the 
protection  of  the  New  World  of  Labor? 

According  to  the  Government  Bureau  of  Economic  In¬ 
formation,  China  has  295,000,000  workers  gainfully  em¬ 
ployed,  the  largest  number  of  any  country  in  the  world, 
or  more  than  seven  times  the  working  force  in  the  United 

13 


14 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


States.  Here,  where  the  struggle  for  life  is  the  fiercest  on 
earth,  it  is  not  surprising  to  find  the  Chinese  the  hardest 
working  race,  for  they  can  over  work  and  under  live  any 
other  nation.  There  is  something  sublime  in  the  endless 
onward  march  of  this  conservative,  majestic,  plodding  peo¬ 
ple.  The  other  ancient  empires — Egyptian,  Assyrian, 
Babylonian,  Macedonian,  Persian  and  Roman — have  long 
since  passed  away;  the  mushroom  growths  of  the  middle 
ages  have  withered;  modern  governments  rise  and  fall  in 
the  kaleidoscopic  changes  of  the  post-war  map  of  Europe, 
but  China  goes  on  forever. 

After  a  tour  of  three  months  through  a  score  of  the  prin¬ 
cipal  cities,  through  the  chief  provinces  from  Manchurh 
in  the  North  to  Canton  in  the  South,  and  from  the  coast  to 
Hunan  in  Mid-China,  we  left  the  country  with  a  deepened 
love  and  admiration  for  the  Chinese  people  and  unshaken 
confidence  in  their  future,  yet  with  a  sense  of  sadness  at 
the  impending  disaster  which  seems  to  threaten  the  central^ 
government,  and  for  the  terrible  conditions  in  the  sweated 
labor  of  the  masses. 

An  examination  of  wages,  hours  and  conditions  in  Chinau 
reveals  the  most  appalling  situation  found  in  the  whole 
world  of  labor.  The  twelve-hour  day  prevails  in  nearly 
all  of  the  modem  factories.  The  work  day  in  the  primitive* 
Chinese  industries  ranges  from  twelve  to  sixteen,  and  in 
some  cases  even  eighteen  hours,  seven  days  a  week.  In 
many  silk  filatures  and  cotton  mills  children  from  six  to 
twelve  years  of  age  are  working.  The  wages  of  these  chil¬ 
dren  vary  from  three  to  twelve  cents  a  day.1  Several 
hundred  thousand  apprentices  receive  nothing  but  their 
food  which  costs  about  six  cents  a  day.  Usually  no  com¬ 
pensation  whatever  is  given  for  accident,  permanent  injury  * 


i  Figures  in  this  chapter  are  given  in  gold  dollars  and  cents. 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 


15 


or  death.  We  found  much  of  the  dangerous  machinery  in 
Chinese  mills  unguarded  and  accidents  are  consequently 
numerous.  The  ancient  family  system  is  breaking  down 
under  the  strain  of  modern  industry,  where  whole  families 
are  in  the  factories  working  on  the  day  and  night  shifts. 

In  order  to  study  the  industrial  situation  we  met  indi¬ 
vidual  employers,  Chinese  and  foreign,  Employers’  Asso¬ 
ciations,  Chambers  of  Commerce,  representatives  of  the 
Cotton  Mill  Owners’  Association  and  others.  We  found 
some  of  these  men  earnestly  desirous  of  improving  present 
conditions.  The  fact  that  some  have  already  introduced 
^jiforms  proves  that  the  situation  is  not  hopeless,  as  some 
^ert,  but  that  conditions  can  be  changed  here  just  as  they 
fave  been  in  other  lands.  The  industrial  situation  in  China 
today  was  paralelled  in  the  worst  days  of  the  industrial 
revolution  in  England  a  century  and  more  ago. 

Chinese  employers  are  for  the  most  part  humane  and 
amenable  to  reason.  Conditions  have  not  become  as  im¬ 
personal  as  in  the  west.  Capital  and  labor  are  not  yet 
separated  by  an  impassable  gulf.  There  is  yet  time  to  save 
the  situation  in  China  from  drifting  into  a  state  of  settled 
warfare  between  employers  and  labor. 

As  typical  of  the  best,  we  found  in  one  factory  under 
ioreign  management  sanitary  conditions,  light,  air,  venti¬ 
lation,  baths  and  welfare  work  of  which  any  factory  in 
America  or  England  might  be  proud.  The  majority  of  the 
workers  had  an  eight-hour  day  and  one  day’s  rest  in  seven. 
Wages  were  unusually  high,  ranging  from  a  minimum  of 
nearly  $5.00  to  over  $50.00  a  month.  The  manager  took 
i  just  pride  in  his  factory  and  a  deep  interest  in  the  work¬ 
ers.  In  every  city  we  found  certain  progressive  open- 
riinded  employers  who  were  well  aware  that  present  con¬ 
ditions  are  not  right  and  are  deeply  anxious  to  change 


16 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


them.  It  is  very  difficult,  however,  for  one  employer  to 
act  alone  when  some  of  his  competitors  care  for  nothing 
but  their  profits. 

We  visited  one  Chinese  Christian  employer  in  Shanghai 
who  has  reduced  the  working  time  from  fourteen  to  ten 
hours  a  day.  He  told  us  that  he  is  now  producing  more 
in  ten  hours  than  he  formely  did  in  fourteen.  He  gives  one 
day’s  rest  in  seven  and  pays  relatively  high  wages  ranging 
from  $8.00  to  $16.00  a  month.  He  has  classes  for  his  boys, 
training  groups  for  his  foremen,  welfare  work  for  his  em¬ 
ployees,  a  co-operative  store  and  a  savings  bank  for  the 
workers.  And  yet  he  earns  an  honest  twelve  per  cent  profit. 
We  visited  the  Commercial  Press  of  Shanghai  with  three 
thousand  employees.  They  employ  no  child  labor,  they 
have  a  minimum  age  limit  of  sixteen  years,  a  nine-hour 
day,  one  day’s  rest  in  seven,  a  free  school  for  five  hundred 
boys  and  girls  and  an  “Industrial  Association”  for  the 
workers.  Their  wage  scale  runs  from  $3.50  a  month  to  over 
$25.00.  The  firm  has  a  plan  of  profit  sharing,  a  savings 
bank,  pension  system,  dispensary  and  hospital.  Mothers 
are  given  a  month’s  leave  of  absence  before  and  after 
childbirth  with  special  bonuses.  One  or  two  such  examples 
prove  that  changes  can  be  made  in  the  present  system. 

Unfortunately  conditions  for  the  vast  majority  of  the 
workers  fall  far  below  these  standards.  According  to  the 
Government  Bureau  of  Economic  Information,  in  cotton 
mills  wages  for  men  run  from  a  minimum  of  5  cents  to  a 
maximum  of  67  cents  gold  with  an  average  of  16%  cents; 
the  wages  for  women  from  5  to  40  cents  with  an  average 
of  13  cents  a  day.  In  steel,  copper  and  iron  works,  wages 
for  men  run  from  6  to  42  cents,  with  an  average  of  15% 
cents,  and  for  women  from  5  to  15  cents  a  day.  The 
average  for  the  basic  industries  of  China  is  only  18% 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA  17 

cents,  and  wages  for  unskilled  laborers  seldom  exceed  12% 
cents  a  day.1 

Over  70  per  cent  of  all  the  laborers  of  China  are  working 
seven  days  a  week.  Professor  J.  B.  Taylor  of  Peking  and 
Miss  W.  T.  Zung  of  Shanghai  state  that,  “The  maximum 
daily  wages  for  men  in  twenty-nine  of  the  chief  industries 
embracing  300,000  workers  range  from  20%  to  51 %  cents 
with  an  average  of  37  cents  a  day  gold,  while  the  minimum 
average  is  4%  cents  a  day.  For  221,000  women,  the  maxi¬ 
mum  is  2%  to  42 %  cents,  averaging  18  cents  and  the 
minimum  is  from  1  to  17^2  cents  with  an  average  of  4% 
cents.2 

The  minimum  living  wage  for  a  man  without  dependents 
in  the  port  cities  has  been  calculated  as  12%  cents,  and 
for  a  man  with  an  average  family  28%  cents  a  day.  “In 
Shanghai  a  careful  study  of  the  cost  of  living  gives  $5.93 
a  month  as  a  living  wage  for  a  single  man  and  $10.67  as 
an  adequate  Iminimum  family  income.”3  If  these  figures 
are  correct  some  40  per  cent  are  living  below  the  poverty 
line. 

Side  by  side  with  the  most  modern  machinery  in  China 
are  conditions  of  work  corresponding  to  those  in  England 
more  than  a  hundred  years  ago.  In  the  factories  a  twelve- 
hour  shift  both  day  and  night  is  the  rule.  Where  there  are 
not  two  shifts  the  work  day  runs  from  ten  to  as  high  as 
eighteen  hours  in  the  primitive  industries.  In  certain  coal 
mines  in  the  North  they  work  a  shift  of  twenty-four  hours 
underground  with  twelve  hours  free  above. 

1  Government  Bureau  of  Economic  Information,  Peking.  According  to  the  sta¬ 
tistics  of  the  Ministry  of  Agriculture  and  Commerce,  a  farm  laborer  averages  1234 
cents  a  day  with  board  and  lodging.  The  Report  of  the  Industrial  Survey  showed 
that  in  Shanghai,  where  wages  are  the  highest  in  China,  skilled  workers  earn  from 
$6.00  to  $18.00  a  month  gold,  averaging  $10.00;  foremen  receive  from  $10.00  to  $12.50; 
unskilled  workers  average  $4.50;  women  $4.00,  and  children  only  $3.00  a  month. 

*  International  Labor  Review,  July,  1923,  p.  8. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  9. 


18 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

Miss  Agatha  Harrison,  formerly  of  the  .London  School  of 
Economics  and  now  the  industrial  expert  of  the  Y.  W.  C.  A. 
in  China,  has  done  a  notable  work  in  the  effort  to  improve 
these  conditions.  She  states  in  most  of  the  factories  there  is 
practically  no  fencing  of  dangerous  machinery  or  sanitary 
equipment  of  any  kind.  Women  and  children,  because  they 
will  accept  lower  wages,  are  rapidly  being  drawn  into  the 
factories.  In  some  of  the  factories  visited,  women  were 
working  with  babies  bound  on  their  backs,  and  in  one  case 
a  woman  had  her  baby  strapped  in  front  in  order  to  feed 
it  while  at  the  same  time  working  with  both  hands  and  a 
foot.  Brought  up  in  the  factory  atmosphere,  children 
learn  to  do  odd  jobs  at  a  very  early  age  and  when  six,  seven 
and  eight  years  old  are  regularly  employed.  Commenting 
upon  the  great  amount  of  dust  in  one  factory  the  manager 
was  asked  if  any  records  were  kept  of  sickness.  His  answer 
was,  “No,  there  are  constantly  new  faces.  They  either  go 
to  the  next  mill  for  more  money  or  to  Kingdom  Come.” 
No  wonder  Dr.  Speer  said  of  the  present  industrial  sys¬ 
tem:  “If  there  are  too  many  lives  in  China,  the  present 
factory  system  will  bring  a  murderous  relief.”  Professor 
Boss  felt  that  the  present  system  was  grinding  the  life  out 
of  millions  of  toilers.1 

We  visited  certain  typical  factories  in  North,  Central  and 
South  China  to  ascertain  present  conditions  of  labor.  We 
first  visited  a  match  factory  under  Chinese  management 
in  the  North.  It  is  said  to  be  the  best  of  its  kind  in  the 
city  and  the  owner  desires  concerted  action  to  improve 

1  “Haunted  by  the  fear  of  starving,  men  spend  themselves  recklessly  for  the  sake 
of  a  wage.  In  many  occupations  men  are  literally  killing  themselves  by  their  exer¬ 
tions.  The  treadmill  coolies  who  propel  the  sternwheelers  on  the  West  River  admittedly 
shorten  their  lives.  Nearly  all  the  lumber  used  in  China  is  hand-sawed,  and  the  saw¬ 
yers  are  exhausted  early.  Physicians  agree  that  carrying  coolies  rarely  live  beyond 
forty-five  or  fifty  years.  The  term  of  a  chair-bearer  is  eight  years,  of  a  ricksha  runner 
four  years;  for  the  rest  of  his  life  he  is  an  invalid.  The  city  coolie  sleeps  on  a  plank  in 
an  airless  kennel  on  a  filthy  lane  with  a  block  for  a  pillow.” 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 


19 


conditions  in  all  the  match  factories  together.  We  found 
in  this  factory  eleven  hundred  employees,  mostly  boys 
from  nine  to  fifteen  years  of  age,  working  from  4  A.  M.  to 
8:30  P.  M.,  with  a  short  intermission  for  meals.  They 
work  an  average  of  fifteen  hours  a  day,  seven  days  a 
week,  with  no  Sunday  of  rest.  The  boys  receive  from  six 
to  twelve  cents  and  the  men  about  twenty-five  cents  gold 
a  day.  The  poisonous  fumes  of  the  white  or  “yellow” 
phosphorus  and  the  dust  from  the  other  chemicals  burned 
our  lungs  within  half  an  hour.  Some  seventy  men  and  boys 
in  this  plant  have  to  visit  the  hospital  each  day  for  treat¬ 
ment.  Many  suffer  from  “phossy  jaw,”  where  the  bones 
of  the  face  decay  on  account  of  the  cheap  grade  of  phos¬ 
phorus  used.  Such  chemicals  have  been  outlawed  in  all 
countries  having  any  regard  for  the  welfare  of  labor. 
They  constitute  a  menace  and  a  challenge  to  China  to 
remove  these  inhuman  conditions. 

We  next  visited  a  Chinese  factory  making  the  most  beau¬ 
tiful  rugs  for  use  in  the  homes  of  millionaires  in  America 
and  China.  But  who  are  making  these  rugs?  Twelve 
hundred  boys  and  young  men,  from  nine  to  twenty-five 
years  of  age,  are  here  employed.  The  foremen  receive  $8.00 
while  other  men  average  $4.50  a  month  and  their  food. 
Men  and  boys  are  working  on  an  average  of  nearly  sixteen 
hours  a  day,  from  5:30  A.  M.  to  10  P.  M.  The  majority 
of  the  boys  serve  as  apprentices  for  a  period  of  three  years 
and  receive  no  pay  whatever  during  this  period  but  only 
their  food.  This  “apprenticeship”  is  only  a  blind  alley. 
After  the  boys  serve  three  years  they  are  then  discharged 
and  other  boys  are  taken  on  to  fill  their  places  on  the  same 
terms.  When  they  are  “graduated”  from  their  apprentice¬ 
ship,  they  can  become  ricksha  coolies  and  earn  an  average 
of  fifteen  to  twenty-five  cents  a  day.  The  fifty  thousand 
ricksha  pullers  in  Peking  average  less  than  this  amount. 


20 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


After  five  or  six  years  of  this  work  they  are  usually  broken 
in  health  and  are  then  useless.  These  conditions  are  not 
due  to  modern  industry  for  they  existed  before  its  entrance 
into  China. 

The  third  plant  visited  was  a  Chinese  tannery  run  by  a 
Christian.  The  conditions  here  are  said  to  be  the  best  of 
all  the  smaller  factories  in  the  city.  The  usual  sixteen 
hours  of  work  a  day  is  reduced  by  this  Christian  employer 
to  ten.  Men  and  boys  earn  from  $5.50  to  $8.50  a  month. 
Apprentices  sleep  in  a  loft  above  the  shop,  and  in  addition 
to  their  food  and  clothes,  receive  thirty-five  cents  a  month 
during  the  first  year,  a  dollar  a  month  the  second  and  $4.00 
a  month,  or  thirteen  cents  a  day,  the  third  year.  The 
industrial  department  of  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  is  permitted  to 
put  on  a  program  of  welfare  work,  athletics  and  games  for 
the  workers.  It  was  most  touching  to  see  the  faces  of  these 
boys  light  up  with  gratitude  when  they  saw  the  industrial 
secretary  of  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  enter  the  shop.  He  knows 
them  personally  and  is  bringing  a  ray  of  light  into  the 
hearts  of  hundreds  of  these  weary  little  toilers. 

The  fourth  factory  was  a  Chinese  weaving  establishment 
making  cloth  upon  primitive  hand  looms.  At  present  there 
are  15,000  boys  in  the  city  working  on  these  looms.  In 
normal  times  there  are  25,000  employed  but  many  are  now 
out  of  work.  The  wages  paid  to  the  men  average  $4.50  a 
month,  or  about  fifteen  cents  a  day.  One  manager  in¬ 
formed  us  that  in  most  of  the  factories  the  workers  average 
eighteen  hours  a  day,  from  5  A.  M.  to  11  P.  M.,  with  short 
intermissions  for  meals,  working  seven  days  a  week.  The 
majority  of  the  boys  are  apprentices  who  receive  no  wage 
whatever,  only  their  food.  They  are  going  without  educa¬ 
tion  and  are  among  the  80  million  in  China  who  are  out  of 
school  with  no  educational  provision  whatever  for  them. 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 


21 


All  of  the  examples  given  above  are  of  primitive  cottage 
or  home  industries  prevalent  in  China. 

Apprentices  are  frequently  hired  out  by  their  poor  parents 
for  no  pay  whatever,  simply  to  relieve  them  of  the  burden 
of  having  to  feed  them  at  a  cost  of  six  cents  a  day.  The 
grim  struggle  for  existence  among  the  silent  millions  in 
China  is  tragic.  No  other  people  on  earth  could  stand  it. 

Let  us  now  examine  working  conditions  in  Shanghai.  We 
visited  a  modern  cotton  mill  under  Chinese  management 
in  the  early  hours  of  the  morning.  Here  girls  and  boys 
from  seven  to  twelve  years  of  age  are  working  twelve 
hours  each  on  the  day  and  night  shifts  and  receiving  eight 
cents  a  day.  Women  of  all  ages  are  earning  about  fifteen 
cents  for  twelve  hours  work.  Common  laborers  are  paid 
from  fifteen  to  eighteen  cents,  while  skilled  workers  receive 
from  twenty  to  thirty  cents  a  day.  Down  the  long  rows  of 
machines  we  occasionally  see  a  woman  who  has  fallen  asleep 
before  daybreak  over  her  work.  Here  and  there  babies  are 
asleep  on  piles  of  waste  or  playing  about  the  machines  at 
which  their  mothers  work  during  the  long  night. 

It  is  now  5:30  A.  M.  and  the  night  workers  are  just 
pouring  out  of  the  cotton  mill.  This  motley  mass  of  hu¬ 
manity  comprise  all  ages  from  one  to  sixty  years,  the  babies 
being  carried  in  the  arms  of  their  mothers.  Here  is  a 
woman  who  has  earned  fourteen  cents  for  her  long  night’s 
toil  leading  her  child  of  twelve  who  has  earned  seven  cents. 
The  mother,  who  is  hobbling  along  on  her  bound  feet,  is 
carrying  a  small  baby  that  is  forced  to  spend  half  of  its 
life  in  the  roaring  factory  where  it  will  play  about  the 
machines  until  it  is  old  enough  to  work.  Here  are  wheel¬ 
barrows,  each  pushed  by  a  man,  carrying  eight  women  with 
bound  feet  or  feeble  ankles  a  mile  or  so  to  their  homes,  at 
a  cost  of  fifty-two  cents  a  month  from  their  slender  wages. 
The  chimneys  are  belching  forth  black  clouds  of  smoke 


22 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


over  the  teeming  city  on  this  dark  winter  morning,  while 
the  alleys  and  streets  are  pouring  forth  their  streams  of 
human  life  back  into  the  ceaseless  roar  of  the  giant  fac¬ 
tories. 

We  note  a  casual  line  in  the  newspaper  telling  of  a  little 
girl  under  twelve  years  of  age,  dragged  into  the  machinery 
by  the  feet  while  asleep  after  four  o’clock  in  the  morning. 
But  why  are  little  girls  under  twelve  working  in  these  fac¬ 
tories  at  that  time  of  night?  Each  morning  before  daylight 
we  hear  the  hoarse  note  of  the  whistles  throughout  the  city 
calling  the  weary  toilers  back  to  their  work  for  the  day, 
and  relieving  the  fatigued  men,  women  and  children  from 
the  long  night  shift  in  these  mills. 

We  noted  the  following  in  the  China  Press  on  November 
29,  1922:  “A  Chinese  woman  employed  in  a  cotton  mill  on 
Gordon  Road  was  choked  to  death  yesterday  when  her 
scarf  caught  and  dragged  her  into  the  machinery.  The 
scarf  twisted  and  tightened  about  her  neck  until  she 
dropped  dead  from  strangulation.”  The  modern  factories 
of  the  industrial  revolution  are  strangling  the  life  out  of 
thousands  in  Asia  today  physically,  mentally  and  spirit¬ 
ually. 

We  visited  a  silk  filature  where  a  thousand  employees 
toil  from  5:30  A.  M.  to  6  P.  M.  Here  we  found  little  girls 
six  years  old  earning  ten  cents  a  day.  Here  are  mothers 
working  with  nursing  babies  lying  on  the  floor  beside  them. 
The  children  learn  to  work  as  soon  as  they  are  able  to  walk. 
Here  they  toil  in  the  hot  steam,  their  hands  deftly  manipu¬ 
lating  the  cocoons  in  the  boiling  water.  The  employers 
say  the  agile  hands  of  little  children  are  best  adapted  to 
this  rapid  work. 

We  next  visited  the  dwellings  of  these  workers.  Here 
is  a  carpenter  who  has  courteously  invited  us  into  his 
“home.”  His  neck  is  full  of  running  sores  from  scrofula, 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 


23 


pouring  out  tubercular  infection  to  the  several  families 
crowded  in  one  small  house.  He  is  earning  thirty-five 
cents  a  day,  or  about  ten  dollars  a  month,  to  support  his 
family  of  three.  Here  in  a  two-story  house  that  is  sub¬ 
divided  into  little  rooms,  dark  holes  and  shelves,  forty 
people,  including  four  families  and  their  relatives,  try  to 
live.  We  found  one  room  ten  feet  square  with  ten  people 
living  in  it,  half  sleeping  during  the  day  and  half  during 
the  night  shift.  They  have  no  stove  in  the  room  and  no 
chimney  to  carry  out  the  smoke  from  the  fire  under  an  iron 
pot  in  which  all  the  cooking  is  done.  There  was  no  latrine 
or  lavatory  in  the  house,  but  simply  a  bucket  in  this  room 
where  day  and  night  ten  people,  men,  women  and  children, 
cook,  eat,  sleep  and  live.  “Live!”  No,  rather  exist! 

The  house  opens  on  a  filthy  alley  six  feet  wide  which  is 
little  more  than  an  open  latrine.  Several  children  were 
suffering  from  sore  eyes  while  others  in  the  alley  had  run¬ 
ning  sores  on  their  heads  and  faces  caused  solely  by  filth 
and  lack  of  care.  There  is,  of  course,  no  bath  room  nor 
place  to  wash  in  these  crowded  quarters.  We  climbed  up 
broken  stairs  to  a  loft  where  we  found  several  dark  rooms 
divided  into  shelves.  Each  hole  rented  for  a  dollar  a 
month.  Some  were  so  dark  we  could  not  at  first  see 
whether  there  were  inmates  or  not. 

Here  is  one  shelf  serving  as  a  home  for  six  people  with 
just  room  enough  to  lie  side  by  side.  One  man  is  dying  of 
tuberculosis,  coughing  day  and  night.  The  five  other  in¬ 
mates  are  packed  in  with  him  on  this  shelf,  which  rents  for 
$1.15  per  month.  For  these  masses,  these  human  “person¬ 
alities,”  there  is  no  available  park,  no  playground,  church, 
Y.  M.  C.  A.,  club  or  reading  room.  They  cannot  read  or 
write.  Life  is  bounded  by  the  factory,  one  dark  street,  and 
the  hole  or  hovel  in  which  they  exist.  As  we  came  out  of 
this  house  a  flock  of  crows  was  perched  upon  a  neighbor- 


24  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

ing  tree  in  the  cold  winter  wind.  We  envied  those  crows  on 
the  clean  limbs  of  that  tree  and  pitied  these  human  beings 
in  their  poverty,  cold,  hunger,  filth  and  squalor.  They 
were  made  for  better  things.  They  were  meant  to  live. 

From  these  homes  we  proceeded  to  the  neighboring  little 
industrial  hospital  where  the  work  is  carried  on  in  an  old 
house  by  a  kind-hearted  medical  doctor.  It  is  the  only 
strictly  industrial  hospital  that  we  have  found  in  China. 
On  the  first  cot  is  a  boy  of  seven  years  of  age  who  has  lost 
two  fingers  in  an  unprotected  machine  in  the  cotton  mill. 
He  was  working  with  his  two  little  sisters.  The  three  of 
them  combined  were  earning  about  eleven  cents  a  day. 
He  will  receive  no  damages  from  the  company  for  this  ac¬ 
cident.  On  the  second  cot  lies  a  little  girl  of  twelve  who 
has  lost  a  portion  of  her  hand  in  an  unguarded  machine. 
Her  face  expressed  a  strangely  quiet  content  for  she  is  hav¬ 
ing  the  first  complete  rest  and  probably  the  first  sufficient 
food  that  she  has  ever  known  in  her  life  of  toil. 

In  the  next  room  of  the  hospital  is  a  little  girl  of  thir¬ 
teen  with  the  flesh  torn  from  her  arm  which  will  disable 
her  for  life.  Here  also  is  a  man  whose  arm  had  been  torn 
off.  He  had  fallen  in  a  fit  of  apoplexy  into  the  machinery. 
Fortunately  the  machine  was  not  injured!  He  was  form¬ 
erly  earning  sixteen  cents  a  day  but  now  that  he  is  unprofit¬ 
able  he  has  been  discharged  and  there  is  nothing  left  for 
him  to  do  but  to  beg  or  starve.  And  so  it  goes  down  the 
wards  of  this  hospital  which  is  treating  some  ten  thousand 
patients  a  year  from  the  mills.  Most  of  the  factories  are 
paying  ten  cents  a  day  for  board  and  treatment  in  this  hos¬ 
pital.  In  some  of  the  Chinese  mills  the  managers  refuse 
to  send  accident  cases  to  the  hospital  to  avoid  paying  this 
paltry  amount.  Ordinarily  no  damages  are  paid  for  acci¬ 
dent,  maiming  or  death.  In  one  mine  recently,  however, 
where  a  number  of  men  were  killed  by  an  explosion,  the 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 


25 


company  allowed  twenty  dollars  for  each  man’s  life.  The 
mules  lost  were  valued  at  fifty  dollars  a  head,  but  human¬ 
ity  is  still  the  cheapest  commodity  in  China. 

Working  such  long  hours  for  such  wages  it  will  be  seen 
in  what  a  favorable  position  this  places  the  employers  of 
China.  Thus  we  read  in  the  Maritime  Customs  Report 
for  1920  concerning  a  certain  Cotton  Spinning  Factory 
which  paid  over  100  per  cent  a  year  following  the  war, 
“The  profits  of  the  factory  again  surpassed  $500,000.  .  .  . 
For  the  past  two  years  it  has  been  running  day  and  night, 
with  scarcely  any  intermission.  The  number  of  hands  em¬ 
ployed  is  2,500,  and  the  following  is  the  wage  table  per 
day:1 


Skilled  labor: 

Minimum 

Maximum 

Men . 

.  17M 

30 

Women . 

.  15 

25 

Ordinary  Labor: 

Men . 

.  15 

25 

Women . 

.  10 

15 

Boys,  aged  about  15  years . 

.  10 

15 

Girls,  aged  about  15  years . 

.  05 

10 

Small  boys,  aged  about  10  years . 

. 05 

10 

Small  girls,  aged  about  10  years . 

. 03  y2 

05 

“It  will  be  seen  that  the  company  is  in  an  exceptionally 
favorable  position.  With  the  raw  material  at  their  doors, 
an  abundant  and  absurdly  cheap  labor  supply  to  draw  on, 
and  no  vexatious  factory  laws  to  observe,  it  is  not  surpris¬ 
ing  that  their  annual  profits  should  have  exceeded  their 
total  capital  on  at  least  three  occasions.”  Truly  the  com¬ 
pany  is  in  an  exceptionally  “favorable  position”  making 
over  a  hundred  per  cent  profit  a  year  after  the  war  while 
paying  children  of  ten  from  3 %  to  5  cents  a  day,  and  a 
maximum  of  30  cents  for  skilled  men  and  foremen. 

Space  forbids  a  description  of  the  factories  in  Canton 
and  South  China  where  conditions  were  similar  to  those  in 


1  Quoted  by  Bishop  McConnell.  All  figures  are  given  in  gold,  not  Mexican. 


26  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

the  North.  In  Canton  we  were  invited  to  meet  with  the 
leaders  of  eighty  labor  unions  who  had  formed  a  Federa¬ 
tion  of  Labor.  As  we  met  these  men  we  were  impressed  by 
the  seriousness  of  the  situation  and  the  desperate  industrial 
conditions  for  which  some  remedy  must  be  found. 

It  is  no  wonder  that  under  such  inhuman  conditions 
there  is  a  growing  unrest  on  the  part  of  labor.  This  has 
been  caused  by  the  world-wide  awakening  after  the  war, 
the  example  of  Russia,  the  agitation  of  the  professors  and 
students  of  the  Renaissance  Movement,  the  articles  in  the 
press  and  the  spontaneous  uprising  of  long  oppressed  masses 
of  Chinese  labor.  The  movement  began  in  North  China 
with  the  student  strike  in  Peking  over  the  Shantung  ques¬ 
tion,  and  in  the  South  in  Canton  in  1920.  During  1921 
there  was  a  successful  strike  in  almost  every  industry  in 
Canton.  The  celebrated  Seamen’s  strike  in  Hong  Kong 
in  January,  1922,  stimulated  a  labor  movement  all  over 
China.  The  president  of  the  Seamen’s  Union  complaining 
of  the  discrimination  against  Chinese  seamen  stated  their 
case  as  follows:  “The  Chinese  have  taken  a  stand  against 
deprivation  of  their  rights,  rough  treatment,  14  hours’  work 
a  day,  and  an  existence  bordering  on  semi-starvation.” 
After  presenting  three  petitions  without  any  satisfactory 
answer,  1,500  seamen  struck  on  January  13,  1922.  By  Jan¬ 
uary  27  the  number  of  strikers  had  reached  30,000.  When 
the  British  Government  of  Hong  Kong  proclaimed  the  Sea¬ 
men’s  Union  an  unlawful  society,  a  sympathetic  strike  of 
coolies,  domestic  servants  and  other  laborers  increased  the 
number  to  some  50,000. 

Within  a  month  166  steamers  were  held  up  with  a  loss 
of  two  and  a  half  million  dollars.  Workers  in  other  parts 
of  China  stood  by  the  strikers.  The  strike  lasted  nearly 
three  months  from  January  13  till  March  5  and  resulted 
in  the  almost  complete  paralysis  of  the  industrial  life  of 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 


27 


Hong  Kong.  On  March  6  the  combined  forces  of  the 
government  and  capital  capitulated,  the  order  was  rescinded 
which  had  declared  the  Seamen’s  Union  unlawful,  and  a 
gigantic  parade  replaced  the  signboard  of  the  union  which 
had  been  raided  by  the  police.  This  was  the  electric  spark 
which  flashed  a  current  of  hope  through  China’s  new  world 
of  labor.  March  6,  1922,  will  mark  a  milestone  in  the 
industrial  history  of  China  like  the  celebrated  Dockers’ 
Strike  in  England  which  organized  successfully  the  un¬ 
skilled  workers  in  1889. 

The  signal  victory  of  the  seamen  in  Hong  Kong  spread 
like  a  contagion  among  the  workers  of  China,  prepared  by 
the  solidarity  of  the  family  clan  and  guild  to  act  together. 
The  movement  extended  northward  along  the  coast,  up 
the  rivers  and  along  the  railways  to  the  miners  in  the  far 
north. 

During  the  latter  half  of  1922,  sixty  labor  organizations 
were  formed  in  Shanghai  alone  and  fifty  strikes  occurred. 
Unfortunately  the  “industrial  labor  spy”  described  by 
Professor  Richard  Cabot  of  Harvard  has  crept  into  the 
situation  in  China,  as  in  Japan.  Of  sixty-eight  of  the 
larger  strikes  recently  conducted  only  four  failed,  six  were 
undecided  and  fifty-eight  were  successful.  It  was  as  in¬ 
evitable  as  it  was  desirable  that  Chinese  labor  should 
organize  to  improve  its  conditions. 

The  modern  trade  union  and  employers’  associations  in 
China  are  developments  growing  out  of  the  common  soil  of 
the  ancient  guild  which  united  both  employer  and  em¬ 
ployee  in  one  movement,  like  the  ancient  guilds  of  England. 
These  Chinese  guilds  date  back  at  least  a  thousand  and  in 
some  cases  possibly  two  thousand  years.  They  were  formed 
to  stabilize  business,  to  secure  justice,  settle  disputes  and 
enforce  their  own  law  upon  competing  employers  or  recal¬ 
citrant  employees  in  these  local  self-governing  democracies. 


28 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


The  power  of  the  guild  was  so  great  that  its  extreme  penal¬ 
ties,  like  those  of  the  all-powerful  caste  system  of  India, 
might  mean  social  ostracism  or  economic  death.  Member¬ 
ship  was  practically  compulsory. 

The  guild  standardized  and  stabilized  wages  and  con¬ 
ditions.  The  employer  seldom  tried  to  lower  or  the  work¬ 
men  to  raise  the  fixed  standard.  All  the  members  of  a 
trade  or  craft  belonged  to  the  guild  in  a  city  or  province, 
with  a  membership  ranging  from  100  to  as  high  as  600,000 
members,  as  in  the  Chihli  cotton  weavers  guild,  where  they 
are  now  fighting  for  their  very  life  in  competition  with  the 
modern  factory  system.1 

The  invasion  of  modern  industry  has  created  two  groups 
with  conflicting  and  diverging  interests  in  the  trade  union 
and  the  employers’  association  developing  out  of  the  com¬ 
mon  root  of  the  guild.  In  the  wealthier  trades  of  the 
north  the  guilds  have  tended  to  become  employers  associa¬ 
tions.  In  the  south  we  found  the  workers  trade  unions 
still  often  called  guilds,  half  evolved  from  the  old  system. 
All  the  evils  of  modern  competitive  capitalism  are  now 
invading  China.  The  Chinese  genius  for  disciplined  sol¬ 
idarity  in  the  joint  family,  the  clan  and  the  guild  enables 
them  to  get  together  quickly  and  act  effectively  in  union. 
Both  employers  and  workers  are  somewhat  timid  and 
ready  for  compromise.  A  small  and  determined  group  have 
the  power  of  intimidation  so  that  labor  leaders  can  coerce 
the  men. 

The  first  National  Labor  Conference  in  China  met  in 
Canton  May  1-6,  1922,  where  160  delegates  from  12  cities 

1  Sfee  Peking,  a  Social  Survey,  by  S.  D.  Gamble,  pp.  163-222,  and  “The  Guilds  of 
China,”  by  H.  B.  Morse,  who  says:  “The  Chinese  trade  guilds  establish  rules  and 
compel  obedience  to  them;  they  fix  prices  and  enforce  adhesion;  they  settle  or  modify 
trade  customs  and  obtain  instant  acquiescence;  they  impose  their  will  on  traders 
in  and  out  of  the  guilds,  and  may  even,  through  the  measure  known  as  the  ‘cessation 
of  all  business,’  cause  the  government  to  modify  or  withdraw  its  orders.” 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 


29 


claimed  to  represent  over  300,000  workers  from  some  200 
unions.  Here  the  unions  pledged  one  another  their  finan¬ 
cial  support  in  case  of  strikes;  agreed  to  stand  for  a  final 
eight-hour  day,  determined  that  the  movement  should  be 
economic  rather  than  political  in  character,  and  decided  to 
form  a  permanent  National  Federation  of  Labor.  The 
mass  of  labor  in  China  is  uneducated,  illiterate  and  easily 
led.  Some  200,000  factory  workers  are  now  organized  in 
the  industrial  cities  and  about  185,000  miners  and  railway 
men.  In  most  of  the  trades  the  old  craft  guilds  are  still 
strong  while  the  trade  union  movement  is  weak  or  un¬ 
organized. 

The  striking  miners  of  the  Kailan  Mining  Administration 
thus  state  their  case:  “The  Administration  holds  us  down 
with  great  severity,  just  as  if  we  were  brigands.  In  respect 
to  our  dangerous  work  in  the  mines,  we  are  treated  with 
less  consideration  than  a  horse  or  a  mule.  ...  If  a  horse 
or  a  mule  is  killed  the  Administration  is  out  one  or  two 
hundred  dollars,  but  if  a  man  is  killed  the  Administration 
does  not  pay  his  family  even  fifty  dollars.  When  a  worker 
is  injured  he  is  taken  out  and  discarded  without  regard  to 
whether  he  lives  or  dies  afterwards.  But  if  a  horse  is  in¬ 
jured  while  in  charge  of  a  worker,  the  worker  is  fined  by 
the  Administration.  The  life  of  the  worker  is  considered 
as  of  no  value.  We  workers  in  the  mines  going  down  into 
the  bowels  of  the  earth  are  as  if  in  hell  itself.  We  are  now 
possessed  of  the  firm  purpose  to  better  our  condition.  We 
shall  not  stop  in  our  efforts  though  it  cost  us  our  lives.” 

A  labor  leader  in  Shanghai  thus  states  the  contention  of 
his  fellow-workers:  “The  occasion  for  all  these  strikes  lies 
in  the  general  injustice  of  wages  and  conditions  in  industry 
today.  Laborers  in  Shanghai  are  working  at  least  ten 
hours  a  day,  some  fourteen  hours  and  a  few  sixteen  hours 
a  day.  As  for  boys  there  are  many  instances  of  wages  of 


30 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


$1.50  to  $2.50  per  month  being  paid.  It  is  useless  for  the 
employers  to  get  the  police  to  suppress  our  organizations 
and  close  our  headquarters.  The  spirit  still  remains  and 
will  break  out  in  a  strike.  The  only  thing  that  will  settle 
the  struggle  is  a  conference.”  Unfortunately  conference 
between  employer  and  employees  is  still  denied  to  labor  in 
some  parts  of  China. 

In  some  places  we  found  detectives  employed  to  arrest 
the  leaders  under  false  charges  and  prevent  labor’s  effec¬ 
tive  organization.  They  were  being  so  hunted  by  the 
police  in  one  city  that  it  was  difficult  for  us  even  to  find 
the  leaders.  Such  a  policy  will  bring  its  own  retribution 
as  in  other  countries.  Many  of  the  evils  in  the  West  are 
due  to  a  misguided  industrial  revolution.  The  people  today 
are  suffering  from  the  exploitation  of  the  workers  in  the 
last  generation.  The  frank  recognition  of  labor’s  right  to 
organize,  to  conferences  between  workers  and  employers,  to 
workers’  education,  reasonable  wages,  hours  and  conditions 
in  China  today  would  save  her  from  possible  violence  and 
bloodshed.  It  is  sad  if  history  is  read  to  no  purpose  and 
if  the  Orient  must  go  on  repeating  the  blind  and  selfish 
mistakes  of  the  misguided  Occident.  When  will  East  and 
West  alike  learn  that  justice  and  nothing  less  than  justice 
will  meet  the  situation  in  the  new  world  of  labor? 

Labor  in  China  as  in  Japan  is  drifting  into  radicalism. 
If  you  do  not  give  men  justice  they  finally  rise  in  fury  to 
take  more  than  justice;  if  you  do  not  allow  evolution,  you 
force  them  to  revolution.  It  is  the  old  alternative  between 
the  British  open  safety  valve  of  liberty  and  the  Czarist 
method  of  repression  which  finally  results  in  a  vast  volcanic 
upheaval  of  hatred  and  destruction. 

China’s  socialism  dates  from  her  great  socialist  philos¬ 
opher  and  statesman,  Wang  An  Shih  of  1021  A.  D.,  before 
the  time  of  the  Norman  Conquest  or  the  Magna  Charta  of 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA  31 

England.  His  state  socialism  was  tolerantly  given  a  ten 
years’  trial  under  the  emperor  Shen  Tsung.1 

A  new  public  conscience  concerning  the  wrongs  of  labor 
is  being  quickened  among  the  intellectuals  and  in  the 
student  class.  The  movement  in  the  North  is  led  by  the 
professors  and  students  of  the  National  University  in  Pe¬ 
king.  Professor  Chen  Tu  Hsin  was  put  out  of  the  Univer¬ 
sity  because  of  his  advanced  ideas.  The  professors  send 
out  the  students  to  organize  labor  and  to  start  night  schools 
and  workers  education. 

The  employers  now  have  the  opportunity  to  change  con¬ 
ditions  if  they  will.  It  is  their  innings.  If  they  maintain 
that  nothing  can  be  done,  labor  and  the  intellectuals  are 
determined  to  see  if  Russian  methods  can  improve  condi¬ 
tions.  The  propaganda  of  Moscow  has  been  spread  broad¬ 
cast  in  Tientsin,  Shanghai,  Hankow  and  Canton  as  in 
Japan.  The  day  of  labor’s  acquiescence  in  its  own  ex¬ 
ploitation  is  passing  forever. 

Viewing  the  country  as  a  whole,  the  people  of  China  are 
slowly,  all  too  slowly,  rising  in  their  standard  of  life.  The 
Chinese  have  steadily  evolved  and  developed  as  a  people  in 
the  social  unity  of  the  family,  the  guild  and  the  race. 
They  are,  however,  as  yet  undeveloped  in  three  important 
points:  in  individual  initiative,  in  the  realization  of  social 
responsibility,  and  in  national  solidarity  in  the  spirit  of 
patriotism  with  a  democratic  sense  of  obligation  for  good 
government.  The  effective  solidarity  that  marks  Japan  is 
still  wanting  in  China. 

1  Wang  An  Shih  advocated  the  following  ideas:  1.  That  the  State  take  the  entire 
management  of  commerce,  industry  and  agriculture  into  its  own  hands  with  a  view 
to  succoring  the  working  classes  and  preventing  them  being  “ground  into  the  dust  of 
the  rich.”  2.  That  tribunals  be  established  throughout  the  land  to  regulate  the  daily 
wage  and  the  daily  price  of  merchandise.  3.  That  the  soil  be  measured  and  divided 
into  equal  areas,  graded  according  to  its  fertility  in  order  that  there  might  be  a  new 
basis  of  taxation.  4.  That  taxes  be  provided  by  the  rich,  and  the  poor  be  exempt. 
5.  That  pensions  be  provided  for  the  aged  and  employment  for  the  unemployed. 

Julian  Arnold,  American  Commercial  Attache. 


32 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


There  is,  however,  a  revolution  in  the  mind  of  Asia  that 
is  affecting  the  leaders  of  this  vast  continent.  If  we  look 
beneath  the  surface  and  come  in  contact  with  the  Renais¬ 
sance  or  “New  Thought  Movement’’  which  is  sweeping 
over  the  students  and  intellectuals  we  find  the  first  evidence 
of  the  birth  of  a  new  China.  These  awakened  students  are 
the  vanguard  of  a  future  democracy.  The  movement 
marks  the  transition  from  the  mediaeval  to  the  modern 
world. 

During  the  last  two  decades  China’s  trade  has  increased 
600  per  cent,  now  standing  at  approximately  one  and  a  half 
billion  dollars.  She  is  still  a  poor  country  and  her  wealth 
like  that  of  India  does  not  greatly  exceed  $100.00  per 
capita.  According  to  the  Special  Report  of  the  Geological 
Survey  of  China,  her  mineral  resources  have  been  greatly 
overestimated.  Her  coal  reserve  of  some  fifty  billion  tons 
is  only  one-third  that  of  Great  Britain  but  she  possesses 
about  half  of  the  world’s  known  resources  in  antimony. 

Nevertheless,  with  large  undeveloped  resources  and  the 
greatest  supply  of  cheap  labor  in  the  world,  China  is  now 
being  rapidly  industrialized.  The  coming  of  modem  in¬ 
dustry  has  been  described  as  “a  terrific  invasion”  for  it 
is  entering  a  social  environment  as  unprepared  for  it  as 
was  mediaeval  Europe.  Thirty  years  ago  there  was  not  a 
western  modern  factory  in  China.  Industry  was  simple 
handicrafts.  Twenty  years  ago  there  were  but  two  modern 
cotton  mills  in  China  with  65,000  spindles.  Today  there 
are  already  102  mills  with  3,165,566  spindles.  Two-thirds 
of  these  are  in  mills  owned  by  the  Chinese  and  about  half 
of  them  have  been  added  in  the  last  four  years. 

The  large  iron  works  near  Hankow  at  full  capacity  em¬ 
ploys  6,000  men  and  can  turn  out  about  300  steel  rails  a 
day.  In  its  cotton  factories,  China  now  has  3,165,566 
spindles  as  compared  with  3,813,680  in  Japan  and  34,000,000 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA  33 

in  the  United  States.  Nearly  100  electric  light  plants  have 
been  installed  within  the  last  dozen  years.  According  to 
the  Report  of  the  Ministry  of  Agriculture  and  Commerce 
there  has  been  a  sudden  invasion  of  industry  in  the  Yangtze 
Valley.1 

This  development  has  affected  some  fifty  cities  in  China. 
The  present  foreign  sections  of  Shanghai  were  mud  flats 
and  rice  fields  a  little  more  than  a  generation  ago.  Today 
the  city  has  over  1,000,000  population,  its  trade  has  passed 
$500,000,000  and  it  is  one  of  the  great  ports  of  the  world. 
It  will  become  one  of  the  most  populous  cities  at  the  mouth 
of  the  world’s  greatest  water  shed,  which  claims  one-tenth 
of  the  world’s  population.  Hankow  with  1,500,000  is  in 
the  center  of  the  iron  and  coal  region.  Canton  has  a 
population  of  950,000,  and  Peking  811,556. 

Already  modern  industry  is  cutting  the  workers  off  from 
their  old  social  life  and  moral  sanctions.  Here  are  millions 
now  divorced  from  the  land  without  property  and  forced 
to  live  a  hand  to  mouth  existence,  as  casual  labor  menaced 
by  the  industrial  revolution. 

Though  China  has  never  had  a  census  her  total  popula¬ 
tion  is  conventionally  estimated  at  400,000,000.  The  Gov- 

1  Within  the  last  two  years  there  have  sprung  up  in  the  YangtzeValley  53  factories, 
26  electric  plants,  18  transportation  companies,  16  cotton  mills,  16  agricultural  enter¬ 
prises,  15  commercial  houses,  12  mining  companies,  3  fisheries  and  8  miscellaneous 
companies,  aggregating  a  total  investment  of  $74,187,470. 

Annual  Report  of  the  Ministry  of  Agriculture  and  Commerce. 

There  are  few  foreign-type  articles  of  domestic  consumption  that  are  not  now 
manufactured  in  China  by  factories  on  modern  lines,  the  majority  of  them  without 
foreign  assistance.  Of  over  1,400  factories  in  China,  339  are  foreign  and  over  1,000 
Chinese.  There  are  218  silk  filatures,  102  ootton  spinning  and  weaving  mills  and  121 
oil  mills.  The  “Commercial  Hand  Book”  lists  among  the  manufacturing  industries 
that  are  assuming  a  position  of  importance,  soap  and  candle  factories,  match  factories, 
ioe  and  aerated  water  factories,  factories  for  the  preparation  of  egg  products,  knitting 
mills,  canneries,  cement  and  brick  works,  chemical  works,  dockyards,  shipbuilding 
and  engineering  works,  furniture  factories,  glass  and  porcelain  works,  cold-storage 
plants,  tanneries,  oil  mills,  paper  mills,  printing  and  lithographic  works,  railway  shops, 
rice  hulling  and  cleaning  mills,  sawmills,  modern  silk  filatures,  silk  mills,  sugar  refineries, 
tobacco  factories,  water  works,  woolen  factories  and  arsenals. 


34 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


ernment  Bureau  of  Economic  Information  in  Peking  esti¬ 
mates  the  number  gainfully  employed  at  295,000,000.  Of 
these  over  80  per  cent  are  engaged  in  agriculture.  Probably 
a  million  are  engaged  in  modern  and  semi-modern  factories, 
and  the  balance  in  simple  handicrafts  and  home  industries 1 
which  one  sees  in  the  open  doorways  and  on  the  streets 
of  every  city  and  village  in  China. 

A  deep  discontent  is  spreading  through  the  ranks  of  labor 
in  China.  Strikes  are  now  occurring  in  almost  every  trade. 
The  workers  are  being  stirred  to  action.  The  leaders  of 
the  Christian  Church  are  beginning  to  realize  their  social 
responsibility.2  Articles  are  now  appearing  in  the  press 
challenging  employers  responsible  for  child  labor,  and  the 
conscience  of  the  community  is  beginning  to  awaken. 

1  Professor  C.  F.  Remer  of  St.  John’s  University,  Shanghai,  tabulates  565,255 
factory  workers  of  whom  234,152  are  men  and  231,103  are  women,  and  estimates  there 
are  49,028,864  families  engaged  in  agriculture.  The  Ministry  of  the  Interior  puts  the 
average  number  of  children  per  family  in  China  at  5.5. 

2  In  substantiation  of  our  impressions  of  a  three  months’  visit  to  China,  we  may 
quote  from  the  findings  of  the  National  Christian  Conference: 

a.  “Wealth  is  becoming  concentrated  in  a  few  hands  and  the  masses  are  left  as 
poor  as  before  but  with  the  added  handicap  of  not  owning  their  own  tools. 

b.  “A  working  day  of  14  to  16  hours  or  even  more,  made  worse  by  the  necessity 
of  long  trips  between  home  and  factory,  is  the  rule. 

c.  “China’s  time-honored  family  system  breaks  down  when  whole  families  are  in 
the  factory  for  day  and  night  shifts,  and  the  development  of  a  better  home  life,  which 
is  one  of  the  deepest  concerns  of  the  Christian  Church,  is  made  impossible. 

d.  “Grave  risks  and  accidents  come  with  the  use  of  high-powered  machinery  and 
of  certain  dangerous  processes  of  manufacture. 

e.  “The  health  of  women  is  seriously  impaired  both  by  night  work  and  by  the 
economic  necessity  of  working  up  to  and  too  soon  after  childbirth. 

/.  “  The  child  labor  problem,  with  its  heavy  toll  on  the  minds  and  bodies  of  Chinese 
citizens,  is  at  its  worst  here;  thousands  of  children  from  6  years  of  age  up  are  employed 
on  both  day  and  night  shifts  of  from  12  to  16  hours.  The  same  arguments  which  had 
to  be  met  in  the  West  are  advanced  here  by  both  parents  and  employers:  ‘They  are 
better  off  than  at  home.  They  must  earn  money.’  The  fact  that  their  tiny  wage 
lowers  the  whole  wage  scale  is  lost  sight  of  in  the  vicious  circle. 

g.  “Conflict  between  labor  and  capital  has  not  yet  developed  in  any  serious  acute 
form,  but  there  are  many  signs  that  labor  is  beginning  to  be  restless  and  to  seek  organ¬ 
ization.  Unless  the  obvious  mistakes  are  avoided  it  is  likely  to  adopt  some  of  the  more 
reckless  measures  of  the  labor  movement  of  the  West  but  with  infinitely  more  serious 
results  due  to  ignorance.” 


INDUSTRIAL  CHINA 


35 


At  the  National  Christian  Conference  held  in  Shanghai 
representing  all  the  Christian  forces  of  the  nation,  Chinese 
and  foreign,  the  industrial  situation  was  studied  by  a 
Commission  on  Economic  and  Industrial  Problems  which 
reported  as  follows:  “In  view  of  the  difficulty  of  immediate 
application  of  the  League  of  Nations  standard  to  the  in¬ 
dustrial  situation  in  China,  the  following  standard  shall 
be  adopted  and  promoted  by  the  Church  for  application 
now: 

“1.  No  employment  of  children  under  12  full  years  of  age. 

“2.  One  day’s  rest  in  seven. 

“3.  The  safeguarding  of  health  of  workers,  e.  g.,  limitation 
of  working  hours,  improvement  of  sanitary  conditions,  and 
installation  of  safety  devices.” 

When  the  writer  was  in  China  he  could  not  find  a  single 
law  in  existence  for  the  protection  of  labor,  national, 
provincial  or  municipal.  News  comes  from  the  Interna¬ 
tional  Labor  Office,  Geneva,  that  China  has  just  taken  the 
first  steps  toward  the  State  regulation  of  labor  conditions. 
In  the  present  condition  of  the  national  government  it  will 
doubtless  be  some  time  before  this  becomes  effective. 
Nevertheless  special  Labor  Sections  have  been  created  at 
Peking  in  the  Departments  of  Agriculture  and  Commerce, 
and  provisional  Factory  Regulations  have  been  pro¬ 
mulgated. 

These  regulations  provide  for — 

The  limitation  of  hours  of  work  to  ten  hours  a  day; 

The  prohibition  of  the  employment  of  boys  under  10  and 
girls  under  12; 

The  limitation  of  hours  of  work  of  children  to  eight 
hours  a  day  for  boys  under  17  and  girls  under  18; 

The  granting  of  five  weeks’  rest  before  and  after  child¬ 
birth  and  a  money  benefit  to  women  employed  in 
industry. 


36 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


These  measures,  which  as  yet  exist  only  on  paper,  may 
be  credited  largely  to  the  able  efforts  of  the  International 
Labor  Organization  of  the  League  of  Nations,  at  Geneva, 
to  promote  universal  standards  of  labor. 

The  number  and  character  of  her  people  and  the  extent 
and  variety  of  her  resources  make  it  inevitable  that  China 
will  become  one  of  the  dominant  factors  in  the  world’s 
industry.  Her  industrial  future  is  a  matter  of  moment  to 
us  all  as  to  whether  it  shall  be  a  menace  or  a  blessing  to 
humanity. 

China  is  now  importing,  not  the  worn  out  rusty  junk 
of  a  bygone  age  but  the  most  up-to-date  inventions  and 
machinery  for  her  modern  plants.  Does  she  not  need  also 
the  most  advanced,  efficient  and  humane  methods  of  dealing 
with  the  far  more  important  and  vital  human  problem  in 
labor?  Now  is  the  crucial  time  for  determining  the  nature 
of  China’s  industrial  future.  Her  people  are  still  demo¬ 
cratic  and  plastic  and  have  not  yet  broken  into  the  antagon¬ 
ism  of  class  war.  All  will  now  depend  upon  the  treatment 
labor  receives.  Employers  have  their  opportunity  now  to 
change  conditions  before  it  is  too  late. 


Chapter  II 
THE  NEW  JAPAN 

As  we  go  to  press  the  recent  earthquake  has  devastated 
portions  of  industrial  Japan.  It  may  take  several  years 
to  recover  the  industrial  level  described  in  this  chapter. 
The  statements  here  made  refer  to  pre-earthquake  condi¬ 
tions.  Upon  arrival  in  the  Far  East  we  found  evidence  of 
the  rise  of  a  new  and  liberal  Japan.  The  feudal,  medieval 
Nippon  of  a  generation  ago  laid  aside  its  bows  and  arrows, 
learned  of  modern  nations  the  lessons  of  militarism,  in¬ 
dustry  and  commerce  and  suddenly  took  its  place  as  a 
world  power.  The  progressive  element  of  the  new  Japan 
is  as  rapidly  learning  the  lesson  that  militarism  is  now  dis¬ 
credited  and  with  equal  earnestness  is  entering  upon  a  new 
era  of  liberalism,  disarmament  and  democracy.  No  nation 
in  history  so  quickly  learned  the  arts  of  war,  of  commerce 
and  of  material  prosperity,  and  perhaps  none  will  more 
quickly  learn  the  art  of  peace.  We  found  that  the  Wash¬ 
ington  Conference  had  cleared  the  air  of  the  dark  war 
clouds  that  threatened  the  Far  East,  and  the  new  progres¬ 
sive  party  is  rising  to  power  in  Japan.  As  Dr.  Ebina, 
President  of  the  Doshisha  University,  expressed  it,  like  a 
chick  breaking  from  its  shell,  the  liberal  Japan  is  today 
breaking  through  the  hard,  encrusted  repression  of  feudal 
militarism  and  a  new  nation  is  coming  to  birth. 

During  the  war  Japan  doubled  her  manufacturing  capac¬ 
ity,  adding  14,000  new  factories.  She  also  increased  the 
volume  of  her  banking  business  four-fold.  At  the  same 
time  she  decreased  her  national  debt  till  it  is  now  the  small¬ 
est  of  any  of  the  allied  nations,  or  only  about  one-twenty- 

37 


38 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


fifth  that  of  the  United  States.  In  thirty  years  the  total 
number  of  factory  workers  advanced  from  twenty-five 
thousand  to  over  a  million  and  a  half.1  In  fourteen  years, 
1904H919,  the  per  capita  wealth  increased  from  $250  to 
$765.  At  the  close  of  the  war  the  national  wealth  was  esti¬ 
mated  at  $43,000,000,000.  The  number  who  paid  income 
tax  on  fortunes  declared  at  over  $50,000  increased  during 
the  war  from  twenty-two  to  three  hundred  and  thirty-six. 
But  the  poverty  of  the  poor  increased  yet  more  rapidly. 
While  a  few  of  the  rich  have  been  getting  richer,  the  masses 
of  the  poor  have  been  getting  poorer  so  far  as  their  real 
wages  are  concerned.  Fourteen  families  and  great  firms 
practically  control  the  wealth  and  industries  of  the  coun¬ 
try.  The  Mitsui  Company  alone,  with  a  working  capital 
of  $100,000,000,  does  one-third  of  the  entire  import-and- 
export  business  of  the  empire,  while  the  Mitsubishi  family; 
controls  and  operates  the  leading  steamship  line. 

The  marvelous  progress  of  Japan’s  industries  has  not 
failed,  however,  to  leave  its  mark  upon  her  people.  One 
of  the  first  things  that  one  notices  in  Japan  is  the  terrific 
strain  to  which  her  whole  population  is  subjected  on  ac¬ 
count  of  the  pressure  of  the  present  industrial  revolution. 
She  possesses  only  a  few  volcanic  islands  of  sand  and  lava 
lying  out  in  the  Pacific.  Her  supplies  of  coal,  iron  and  raw 
materials  are  quite  inadequate  for  her  own  expanding 
needs.  A  large  part  of  her  territory  is  mountainous,  and 
only  seventeen  per  cent  can  be  cultivated,  as  compared  with 
ninety  per  cent  in  a  country  like  Germany.  Despite  her 
scientific  methods  of  caring  for  her  mountain  forests,  she  is 
compelled  even  to  import  timber  from  America.  Already 

i  According  to  Factory  Statistics  for  1919,  published  by  the  Department  of  Agri¬ 
culture  and  Commerce,  the  number  of  factories  employing  more  than  five  workers, 
was  43,949,  with  a  total  of  1,611,990  laborers,  741,193  males  and  870,797  females 
being  engaged  in  industry. 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


39 


overcrowded,  with  three  hundred  and  sixty  people  to  the 
square  mile,  as  against  thirty-three  to  the  square  mile  in 
the  United  States,  her  population  is  increasing  at  the  rate 
of  over  700,000  a  year.  Her  rice  land  is  inferior  to  the  best 
farm  land  in  America,  yet  it  sells  for  five  times  as  much. 
Her  staple  crop  is  rice.  With  the  production  of  this  the 
most  important  food  supply  increasing  at  the  rate  of  four 
per  cent  a  decade  while  the  number  of  mouths  to  be  fed  in¬ 
creases  twelve  per  cent,  Japan  is  forced  to  import  an  in¬ 
creasingly  large  amount  of  food  supplies  from  other  coun¬ 
tries. 

Worst  of  all  Japan  is  in  the  grip  of  domestic  and  world 
competition  and  is  being  ground  between  the  upper  and 
nether  mill  stones  of  the  cheap  labor  of  the  Orient,  and 
the  massed  wealth  and  efficient  industrial  organization  of 
the  Occident.  On  the  one  side  she  is  forced  to  compete 
with  the  cheap  labor  of  China  where  children  of  ten  are 
working  for  a  daily  wage  of  five  and  ten  cents,  and  women 
for  twenty  cents  a  day.  The  Japanese  cannot  compete 
with  cheaper  Chinese  laborers  who  underlive  and  out-work 
them.  On  the  other  side  are  the  western  countries  with 
their  great  stores  of  raw  material,  well  organized  factories 
with  modern  machinery,  and  accumulated  wealth  which 
make  competition  so  difficult  for  the  new  industrial  Japan. 

According  to  statistics  furnished  by  the  Ohara  Institute 
of  Social  Research  of  Osaka,1  92.7  per  cent  of  the  families 

1  Statistics  showing  percentage  of  rich  and  poor: 


No.  of  Per  cent 

houses  of  total 

Below  $250  a  year .  9,007,856  92.7 

Between — 

$  250-$  500  .  556,770  5.7 

500-  1,000 .  102,663  1.0 

1,000-  1,500  .  25,506  0.3 

1.500-  2,500 .  16,312  0.2 

2.500- 10,000 .  10,517  0.1 

From  $10,000  and  upward .  812  .... 


40 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


in  Japan  were  living  on  an  income  of  less  than  $250  a  year, 
or  68  cents  a  day  for  a  family  of  five,  while  at  the  other 
extreme  812  families  were  receiving  $10,000  or  more  a 
year. 

Although  Japan  is  being  rapidly  industrialized,  her  rural 
population  is  still  seventy  per  cent  of  the  whole.  The  five 
and  a  half  million  farming  families  in  Japan  cultivate  some 
fifteen  million  acres,  or  an  average  of  about  two  and  three- 
fourths  acres  per  family.  Nearly  half  are  tenant  farmers. 
The  American  farmers  average  148  acres  per  family,  or 
over  fifty  times  as  much  as  the  Japanese  farmer.  A  grow¬ 
ing  unrest  among  the  agrarian  toilers  who  cannot  pay  their 
rent  and  taxes  or  who  cannot  live  upon  their  slender  wages 
is  increasingly  manifest.  Even  in  feudal  times  there  were 
“peasant  uprisings”  among  the  oppressed  agrarians,  but 
radical  ideas  are  now  brought  home  by  members  of  the 
farming  families  returning  from  the  manufacturing  dis¬ 
tricts  so  that  tenant  troubles  are  increasing.  In  the  prov¬ 
ince  of  Gifu  alone,  114  tenant  unions  have  been  organized 
recently.  These  unions  have  been  successful  in  securing 
their  demands  and  enabling  the  farmers  to  obtain  better 
terms  from  the  landlords,  to  decrease  their  rent  as  tenants 
or  increase  their  wages  as  workers. 

Japan’s  crucial  problem  today  is  economic  and  industrial. 
There  are  now  approximately  1,611,990  industrial  workers 
engaged  in  43,949  factories.1  A  large  proportion  of  these 


1  Industrial  workers  in  Japan .  1,611,990 

Farming  families  in  Japan .  5,481,187 

Per  cent. 


Gainfully  employed  in  United  States _  41,609,192  50.3 

Or,  50.3  per  cent  of  population  over  10 
years  of  age. 

Gainfully  employed  in  manufacturing  in 

United  States .  12,812,701  30.8 

Gainfully  employed  in  agriculture .  10,951,074  26.3 

U.  S.  Census  1920, 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


41 


are  women.  Independent  researches  of  the  Home  Office 
put  Japanese  child  operatives,  apprentices,  servants,  etc., 
roughly  at  1,397,000,  of  whom  715,000  are  boys  and  682,000 
girls.  Their  working  hours  were  from  ten  to  eleven  a  day. 
As  yet  Japan  has  no  law  regulating  child  labor  outside  of 
factories.  Many  thousands  of  children  are  employed  who 
are  below  the  legal  age  but  “face”  is  saved  by  giving  their 
nominal  age.  A  Japanese  professor  who  made  a  careful 
investigation  found  that  in  Shinshu,  Northern  Japan, 
nearly  a  third  of  the  workers  are  between  ten  and  fifteen 
years  of  age.  The  fathers  are  paid  from  $40.00  to  $60.00 
for  each  child  delivered  to  the  factory.  They  are  kept  in 
dormitories  which  are  for  some  of  them  almost  a  prison. 

Japan  has  an  area  a  little  larger  than  the  British  Isles 
or  about  equal  to  the  state  of  California,  with  a  population 
now  estimated  at  about  fifty-six  millions  for  Japan  proper, 
or  seventy-seven  millions  for  the  Empire  as  a  whole.1 

She  possesses  all  of  the  five  conditions  necessary  for  rapid 
industrialization  mentioned  by  Mr.  J.  A.  Hobson  in  his 
“Evolution  of  Modern  Capitalism”:  “Accumulated  wealth, 
a  proletariat  or  propertyless  laboring  class,  machinery  and 
industrial  arts  developed  to  a  high  degree,  large  accessible 
markets  and  the  capitalistic  spirit.”  Japan  possesses  also 
the  solidarity  to  move  together  and  act  unitedly  and  ef¬ 
fectively  in  whatever  project  her  leaders  undertake  in  the 
military,  political  or  industrial  field.  In  the  short  half 
century  from  the  time  she  entered  the  modern  world  in 
1868,  her  trade  increased  from  $13,000,000  to  $2,141,000,000 

1  According  to  the  Census  of  1920,  the  population  of  Japan  was  as  follows: 


Japan  Proper . 55,961,140 

Korea .  17,284,207 

Formosa .  3,654,398 

Karafuto .  105,765 


Total  for  Japanese  Empire .  77,005,510 


The  Japan  Year  Book,  1921-22. 


42 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


in  1920, 1  or  more  than  one  hundred  and  sixty-fold.  Her 
trade  has  increased  ten-fold  in  volume  during  the  last  quar¬ 
ter  of  a  century. 

No  change  has  taken  place  as  suddenly  as  in  the  so- 
called  industrial  revolution  in  England  but  the  simple  do¬ 
mestic  industries  are  being  gradually  transferred  to  the 
modern  shops  and  factories.  The  five  great  industrial 
cities  have  increased  in  size  thirteen  times  as  rapidly  as  the 
country  as  a  whole.  Tokyo,  the  Chicago  of  Japan,  has  a 
population  of  over  two  millions,  and  Osaka,  the  smoke- 
covered  Pittsburgh,  has  nearly  a  million  and  a  half. 

The  wages  paid  to  industrial  workers  in  Japan  are  quite 
inadequate  to  the  high  cost  of  living  since  the  war.  The 
Japan  Year  Book  states  the  average  daily  wage  for  men  is 
55  cents  and  for  women  27  cents.2  In  the  poorer  paid  in¬ 
dustries  the  women  average  only  20  cents  a  day.  A  thor¬ 
ough  investigation  conducted  by  one  of  the  foremost  econo¬ 
mists  in  Japan  revealed  the  fact  that  the  average  wage 
paid  to  the  workers  in  the  leading  industries  in  Tokyo  is 
less  than  fifty  cents  a  day.  In  some  of  the  iron  and  steel 
mills  the  minimum  wage  for  unskilled  labor  runs  as  low  as 
20  cents  for  twelve  hours’  work.  The  maximum  for  skilled 
workers  is  one  or  two  dollars  a  day.  With  their  compli¬ 
cated  wage  scale,  which  deducts  so  much  in  fines  for  petty 

1  The  Japan  Year  Book,  1921-1922,  p.  387. 

Labor  Year  Book,  1921,  p.  449. 

2  The  average  daily  wage  of  workers  is  as  follows :  (figures  in  gold) : 


1920 

Weaver,  male .  $  0.87 

Weaver,  female .  -47 

Carpenter .  1-25 

Silk-spinner,  female . .36 

Tailor .  -48 

Farm  labor,  a  day .  .72 

Farm  labor,  a  year,  female .  43.30 

Farm  labor,  a  year,  male .  70.50 


Japan  Year  Book,  1921-1922,  pp.  176-177,  figures  in  gold. 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


43 


mistakes  on  the  part  of  the  workers,  wages  in  some  fac¬ 
tories  fluctuate  from  month  to  month  until  the  men  are 
never  sure  of  the  amount  they  will  receive. 

Perhaps  the  worst  conditions  among  the  workers  are 
found  in  the  mining  areas.  The  Report  of  the  Bureau  of 
Mines  showed  that  the  number  of  miners  employed  at  the 
end  of  June,  1920,  was  439,159,  of  whom  108,300  were 
women.  Of  the  total  number  of  women  workers  68,321 
were  working  underground.  They  go  down  into  the  mines 
where  in  many  places  the  veins  of  coal  are  only  about  two 
and  a  half  feet  thick.  There  they  work  long  hours  for 
less  than  fifty  cents  a  day.  Women  are  employed  to  push 
the  coal  cars  to  the  shafts.  Stripped  to  the  waist,  they 
toil  for  a  pittance  for  twelve  hours  on  each  shift.  An  in¬ 
vestigation  conducted  by  Professor  Kitazawa,  of  the  De¬ 
partment  of  Economics  in  Waseda  University,  revealed  the 
fact  that  the  actual  wages  were  often  below  those  published 
in  the  Government  reports.  His  figures  run  from  a  mini¬ 
mum  of  twenty  cents  to  a  maximum  of  a  dollar  a  day. 
An  investigation  concerning  hours  of  work  showed  that 
the  average  working  day  in  the  cotton  mills  was  14  hours. 
The  average  working  day  in  steel  mills  was  12  hours.  Only 
12  per  cent  of  all  the  workers  have  an  eight-hour  day.  The 
average  working  week  in  Japan  is  63  hours,  or  seven  days 
of  nine  hours  each.  Many  of  the  workers  enjoy  two  rest 
days  a  month. 

One  night  in  Tokyo  we  met  the  employers  in  the  paternal 
organization  for  the  “Conciliation  of  Capital  and  Labor.” 
They  have  collected  a  fund  of  $1,250,000  for  propaganda 
contributed  by  employers.  The  Industrial  Club  is  also  a 
capitalists’  organization  backed  by  $5,000,000,  the  money 
being  used  for  propaganda  in  order  to  get  the  employers 
.and  laborers  together  that  production  may  be  increased. 


44  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

The  benevolent  intentions  and  useful  work  of  many  of  the 
men  connected  with  these  organizations  is  undoubted. 

From  this  meeting  with  the  capitalists,  we  went  down 
into  the  slums  to  meet  a  dozen  labor  leaders.  One  of  the 
employers  had  just  stated  that  there  was  no  unrest  among 
the  laborers  in  Japan  and  that  the  workers  would  be  quite 
contented  if  only  left  alone.  The  labor  leaders  laughed 
with  scorn  at  this.  Some  members  of  the  group  said  they 
were  earning  from  thirty  to  sixty  cents  a  day.  One  man 
was  trying  to  support  a  family  of  eight  on  a  little  more 
than  a  dollar  a  day.  He  had  been  forced  to  give  one  child 
away  to  keep  it  from  starving. 

The  next  man,  a  Christian  labor  leader,  then  told  his 
story.  He  had  worked  long  hours  for  twenty-five  cents  a 
day  at  first,  but  finding  it  impossible  to  support  himself 
and  his  family  on  this  amount,  he  started  to  work  overtime 
to  increase  his  income.  Although  working  long  after  the 
regular  hours  he  could  only  make  fifty  cents  a  day.  He 
found  it  difficult  to  support  his  family  even  by  adding  two 
or  more  hours  to  the  regular  shift  of  fourteen  hours  a  day. 
At  times  on  a  change  of  shift,  he  had  to  work  for  thirty 
or  more  hours  at  a  stretch.  For  two  weeks  straight  he 
worked  twenty  hours  a  day  with  only  four  hours  for  sleep. 

After  fourteen  years  of  such  work,  his  health  was  broken 
on  account  of  lack  of  rest  and  proper  nourishment.  He 
said:  “My  body  was  broken,  my  mind  dulled,  and  my 
whole  character  was  disintegrating.  I  had  no  time  for  my 
family,  no  interest  in  production  or  in  anything  else.  I 
lost  my  skill.  I  had  sunk  with  the  masses  of  *ny  fellow- 
workers  into  poverty  and  had  become  like  a  part  of  the 
machinery.  Then  the  trade  union  movement  came  and  I 
seized  upon  it  with  hope,  for  it  gave  us  a  chance  to  fight 
for  higher  wages,  shorter  hours  and  one  rest  day  a  week. 
But  this  is  only  our  first  step.  Frankly,  we  are  out  to 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


45 


completely  abolish  industrial  slavery  and  in  the  end  the 
capitalist  wage  system.  They  may  not  recognize  our  unions 
or  acknowledge  that  we  have  any  right,  but  we  shall  be¬ 
come  strong  enough  to  enforce  our  will.  For  myself,  I  am 
a  Christian  communist.  If  they  have  failed  in  Russia,  that 
is  because  they  have  not  had  a  fair  chance  with  the  in¬ 
vasion  of  the  Allied  armies  and  with  the  leaders  of  the 
world  against  them.” 

Another  of  the  leaders  said:  “To  be  frank  with  you,  we 
are  all  radicals  and  out  to  abolish  the  present  system,  be¬ 
cause  the  government,  the  capitalistic  courts,  and  the  big 
business  men  are  all  united  against  us.  We  have  arrived 
late  upon  the  scene  in  the  labor  world,  but  we  have  started 
with  advanced  ideas  and  principles.  Today  we  are  per¬ 
secuted,  hounded,  and  betrayed,  but  in  the  end  we  will 
win.  If  a  few  of  us  meet  together  to  discuss  the  calling 
of  a  strike,  or  even  the  forming  of  a  labor  union,  the  police 
can  punish  us  on  suspicion  without  trial.  Several  hundred 
men  in  the  labor  unions  have  been  thus  persecuted.  The 
police,  the  severe  laws,  “special  orders”  and  all  the  forces 
of  militarism  and  capitalism  are  used  to  crush  our  labor 
movement.  The  employers  dismiss  our  leaders  whose 
names  are  placed  on  the  blacklists  of  the  government  and 
of  the  business  men. 

“Another  injustice  which  we  have  to  deal  with  is  the 
labor  spy  system.  Spies  are  scattered  among  the  workers 
to  learn  their  plans.  They  seek  to  stir  up  dissension,  under- 
jmine  the  workers  and  leaders,  and  break  up  their  unions 
like  the  Fascisti  in  Italy.  The  government  and  capitalists 
have  used  ruffians  and  gamblers,  who  are  members  of  the 
so-called  ‘Nationalistic  Society’  which  is  used  to  fight  labor. 
These  ruffians  make  raids  on  the  labor  meetings,  using 
violence  and  sometimes  seriously  injuring  those  who  are 
taking  part.  Many  have  been  wounded  and  several  killed 


46 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


by  these  tools  of  capital  and  the  government.  The  police 
shadow  our  leaders  and  frequently  raid  our  headquarters. 
But  we  are  not  discouraged.  We  will  win  justice  in  the 
end;  we  are  out  for  no  halfway  measures;  no  ‘welfare’  or 
paternal  schemes  will  satisfy  us ;  we  want  nothing  less  than 
social  justice.  As  it  is,  we  have  not  been  allowed  to  send 
our  own  bona  fide  labor  representatives  to  the  Labor  Con¬ 
ferences  at  Washington  or  Geneva.  The  workers  utterly 
repudiated  the  tools  sent  by  the  government  and  the  capi¬ 
talists  on  behalf  of  the  laborers  of  Japan.” 

Following  a  dinner  given  by  the  managers  of  the  Sumi¬ 
tomo  Copper  Works  in  Osaka,  we  met  the  labor  leaders  in 
their  little  stuffy,  dirty  headquarters  to  talk  over  industrial 
problems  there  as  we  had  in  Tokyo.  Hard  grinding  toil, 
prison  sentences  and  uncertainty  of  employment  have  left 
their  marks  forever  on  the  faces  of  these  men,  and  the 
injustice  of  the  present  system  has  left  a  bitterness  in  their 
hearts.  One  leader  said:  “The  government  will  not  allow 
the  unions  to  use  men  for  picketing.  The  strikers  are  not 
allowed  to  hold  meetings,  and  if  they  come  together  for 
any  kind  of  discussion  they  are  prevented  from  saying 
anything  pertaining  to  the  strike  or  their  rights.  Freedom 
of  speech  is  out  of  the  question  during  a  strike,  for  the 
policemen  and  hired  ruffians  break  up  the  meetings  and 
prevent  the  speakers  from  delivering  their  message  to  the 
workers.  Here  in  Japan  the  capitalists  are  doing  all  they 
can  to  break  the  unions  and  prevent  the  workers  from 
coming  together.  If  any  worker  belongs  to  a  union  and  is 
trying  to  get  others  to  join,  he  is  discharged  at  once. 

“Christianity  has  done  nothing  thus  far  to  help  the  labor 
movement  and  the  majority  of  the  workers  feel  that  it  has 
been  a  hindrance.  The  workers  are  not  allowed  to  hold 
meetings  in  the  churches  where  we  can  discuss  our  prob¬ 
lems  or  have  a  place  to  come  together  for  study.  Nearly 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


47 


all  of  the  factory  managers  use  Christian  pastors  or  Budd¬ 
hist  priests  to  come  to  talk  to  them  about  their  work  and 
try  to  get  them  to  see  that  they  must  not  strike  or  cause 
trouble.  The  pastors  are  paid  by  the  capitalists  to  use  their 
Christian  message  to  keep  our  workers  down.  For  this 
reason  the  workers  have  no  faith  in  religion  as  they  see  it 
today  among  the  Buddhists  or  Christians. 

“The  industrial  spy  system  in  Japan  is  one  of  the  worst 
evils  with  which  we  have  to  contend.  Something  like  five 
thousand  spies  are  hired  by  the  government  and  the  em¬ 
ployers.  These  men  are  called  “professional  gamblers’’  by 
the  workers.  When  a  strike  takes  place  these  men  go  in  to 
beat  up  the  strikers.  They  pose  as  workers  who  stand  for 
the  country  and  the  Emperor.  They  try  to  make  use  of 
their  patriotism  by  fighting  the  men  who  are  striking  to 
make  it  appear  that  the  strikers  are  traitors  to  their  coun¬ 
try.”  Just  a  hundred  years  ago  we  read  that  in  England 
“the  use  of  spies  was  common  in  all  times  of  upper  class 
panic.”1 

Among  the  Japanese  employers  a  small  number  are  show¬ 
ing  a  genuine  interest  in  and  intelligent  sympathy  with  the 
struggles  of  labor  for  better  conditions.  They  recognize 
that  no  fair-minded  man  could  defend  present  conditions  in 
Japan.  Men  like  Viscount  Shibusawa  and  Baron  Sumitomo 
have  come  forward  with  plans  for  real  co-operation  with 
labor.  The  Sumitomo  Copper  Works  constantly  sends  men 
to  America  to  study  the  most  successful  plans  in  operation 
there.  They  have  shop  committees  composed  of  an  equal 
number  of  representatives  elected  by  the  thirty  thousand 
workers  and  by  the  employers,  which  meet  to  discuss  hours, 
wages  and  conditions  of  work.  With  their  eight-hour  work¬ 
ing  day,  their  insurance  against  unemployment,  retirement 


*  *  Hammond,  “The  Town  Laborer,”  p.  258. 


48  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

allowances,  accident  policies,  pension  fund  and  a  wage  scale 
higher  than  any  of  the  other  factories  in  the  Osaka  district, 
the  managers  of  this  large  steel  and  copper  works  are  doing 
more  to  solve  the  problems  of  labor  than  the  majority  of 
leading  concerns  in  America  and  England.  But  while  Baron 
Sumitomo  and  nearly  a  hundred  other  employers  in  Osaka 
are  providing  fair  treatment  for  their  men,  there  are  over 
1,900  manufacturers  in  the  city  whose  men  receive  little 
consideration.  With  profit  as  the  chief  motive,  the  workers 
are  treated  merely  as  cogs  in  a  vast  machine. 

An  open-minded  employer  in  Nagoya  said  to  us :  “Labor 
organizations  are  sure  to  come  in  Japan.  It  is  only  a 
matter  of  time.  In  the  conflict  between  capital  and  labor 
today  the  capitalists  are  sixty  per  cent  to  blame  and  the 
workers  forty  per  cent.  I  hold  the  employers  responsible 
for  the  trouble  because  we  are  trying  to  make  too  much 
profit  and  refusing  to  pay  the  workers  as  much  as  they 
deserve.  They  are  also  refusing  to  allow  the  men  to  have 
any  voice  in  their  own  affairs  concerning  working  hours, 
wages  and  conditions  of  labor.  It  is  the  refusal  to  recog¬ 
nize  that  the  men  who  are  doing  the  hard  work  are  human 
that  is  causing  the  trouble.” 

In  sympathy  with  these  laboring  masses  are  many  young 
officials  in  all  departments  of  the  government.  Long  before 
Japan  has  to  face  any  foreign  foe  she  must  reckon  with 
her  real  problem:  the  rise  of  an  insistent  democracy  and 
the  demands  of  the  growing  radicalism  of  her  discontented 
poor.  The  revolutionary  upheaval  in  the  West  has  made  a 
profound  impression  on  the  masses  in  Japan. 

An  investigation  in  Tokyo  showed  that  from  the  physical 
standpoint  a  steady  process  of  deterioration  of  the  work¬ 
ers  is  going  on.  Most  of  them  come  from  the  country.  In 
the  city  they  find  bad  air  in  homes  and  factories;  food 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


49 


poorly  cooked  and  of  inferior  quality;  often  low,  damp, 
floors  in  houses  situated  on  flats  which  are  flooded  with 
every  heavy  storm;  sanitary  conditions  which  breed  con¬ 
tagion  and  dangerous  sickness ;  long  hours  of  work,  standing 
from  twelve  to  sixteen  hours  at  high  powered  machines; 
unhygienic  factory  conditions,  with  dust  and  chemicals  in 
the  air;  overcrowding  of  dormitories;  night  work  for 
women  and  girls;  child  labor  with  the  stunting  of  growth. 
The  approximately  half  million  workers  recruited  annually 
from  the  best  blood  of  the  country  is  like  a  pure  mountain 
stream  polluting  itself  as  it  pours  into  the  stagnant  waters 
of  a  swamp.1 

Generally  speaking  labor  in  Japan  is  working  long  hours 
for  low  wages  under  conditions  of  poverty.  A  living  stand¬ 
ard  for  Japan  has  been  calculated  by  the  Rev.  T.  Kagawa 
of  Kobe  and  his  industrial  research  department  for  an 
average  family  of  five  persons.  They  require  two  rooms, 
each  a  little  less  than  ten  feet  square,  and  a  wage  of 
$41.25  for  five  persons,  or  about  $8.00  a  month  per  person. 
The  majority  of  the  workers  in  Japan,  however,  receive 
less  than  $35.00  a  month  per  family,  or  about  a  dollar  a 
day,  and  have  less  than  this  housing  accommodation. 
According  to  the  official  inquiry  of  the  Home  Office  in  1915, 


1  The  Japan  Chronicle  states:  “Few  can  stand  the  strain  for  more  than  one  year, 
when  death,  sickness  or  desertion  is  the  outcome.  Thus  eighty  per  cent  leave  the  mills 
every  year  through  various  causes,  their  places  being  taken  immediately  by  new  hands. 
.  .  .  The  women  on  the  day  and  night  shifts  are  obliged  to  share  the  same  bed. 

.  .  .  Consumption  and  other  epidemics  take  a  terrible  toll  of  the  workers.  The 
number  of  women  recruited  as  factory  workers  each  year  reaches  200,000.  Of  these, 
120,000  do  not  return  to  the  parental  roof.  Either  they  become  birds  of  passage  mov¬ 
ing  from  one  factory  to  another,  or  go  as  maids  in  dubious  tea  houses  or  as  illicit  pros¬ 
titutes.  Among  the  80,000  who  return  home,  13,000  are  found  to  be  sick,  25  per  cent 
having  contracted  consumption.” 

An  investigation  in  the  Shinshu  district  showed  that  20  per  cent  of  the  industrial 
patients  in  the  hospital  were  there  because  of  undernourishment  and  approximately 
40  per  cent  on  account  of  tuberculosis. 


50 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


the  monthly  earnings  of  the  poor  in  the  industrial  slums 
ranged  from  $2.50  to  $10.00  a  month.1 

It  is  one  thing  to  note  these  facts  on  poverty  in  abstract 
statistics,  but  it  is  quite  another  to  see  them  in  actual  life. 
We  went  through  the  foul  slums  of  Tokyo  where  34  per 
cent  of  the  people  in  this  section  of  the  city  are  working, 
eating  and  sleeping  in  one  small  room  which  affords  each 
family  of  five  less  than  eight  feet  square,  or  about  the  space 
of  a  double  bed.  The  other  66  per  cent  in  the  slums  have 
an  average  space  of  less  than  ten  feet  square  for  a  family. 
In  each  block  there  are  from  twenty  to  thirty  little  alleys. 
Each  alley  six  feet  wide  serves  as  a  street  for  twenty  or 
more  families  which  inhabit  the  little  one  room  hovels. 

In  Osaka  and  Kobe  we  found  conditions  worse  than  in 
Tokjm.  Crowded  into  two  small  districts  are  thousands 
of  people  living  in  little  dark,  dog  kennels,  six  feet  wide 
and  eight  feet  long.  Twenty-eight  families  live  in  each 
alley,  at  either  end  of  which  are  two  filthy  latrines  used 
by  all.  The  inhabitants  are  underfed,  overcrowded  until 
they  have  to  sleep  side  by  side,  men,  women  and  children, 
all  together.  There  is  the  foul  air  from  the  open  sewers 
and  the  smoke  of  the  factories,  the  people  die  like  flies. 
We  could  see  the  great  chimneys  of  the  factories  where 
Osaka,  with  her  rapid  industrialization,  is  making  money, 
but  is  burning  up  her  childhood  under  the  dark  pall  of 
factory  smoke.  Here  in  the  heart  of  the  greatest  industrial 
district  is  Osaka  with  the  highest  death  rate  of  any  city 
in  the  world,  and  Kobe  which  ranks  fourth,  following  two 
starving  German  cities.  Here  are  the  diseased,  the  feeble¬ 
minded,  criminals,  deserted  wives  and  children,  the  families 
of  men  who  are  now  in  prison,  ex-convicts  and  masses  of 
the  poor.  Twenty  thousand  human  beings  herded  together 
like  dumb  beasts  are  trying  to  live  on  less  than  twenty 


1  Japan  Year  Book,  1922,  p.  178. 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


51 


cents  a  day  each.  From  such  families  eighty  per  cent  of 
the  prostitutes  have  been  driven  to  their  present  life  on 
account  of  poverty.  A  father  of  a  starving  family  can  now 
lease  his  daughter  for  three  years  for  the  sum  of  $800. 

The  majority  of  the  people  in  Japan  have  no  home  of 
their  own,  no  land,  no  tools,  no  certain  means  of  livelihood. 
Wages  are  quite  inadequate  for  the  present  high  cost  of 
living.  Thousands  of  the  factory  girls  are  working  from 
twelve  to  seventeen  hours  a  day  and  receiving  a  daily  wage 
of  from  twenty  to  thirty  cents.  About  one-fourth  of  the 
laborers  of  Japan  are  boys  and  girls.  These  patient  toilers 
show  signs  of  breaking  under  the  terrific  strain  of  modern 
industrialism. 

The  average  family  consists  of  five  persons,  but  in  very 
many  cases  two  or  more  families  occupy  the  same  room. 
In  addition,  many  laborers  board  in  such  homes  and 
sleep  indiscriminately  with  the  family.  The  moral  con¬ 
ditions  of  the  dormitories  for  girl  workers  in  some  fac¬ 
tories,  especally  certain  spinning  mills,  are  extremely  bad. 
Unscrupulous  overseers  and  wardens  in  some  cases  are 
known  to  hold  girls  in  virtual  moral  slavery.  One  expert 
on  factory  conditions  states  that  it  is  not  uncommon  for 
one-half  of  the  girls  employed  in  certain  mills  to  lose  their 
virtue  within  a  year  after  entering  the  mill. 

Long  working  hours  and  extreme  fatigue  induce  the  de¬ 
sire  for  unhealthful  excitement  and  vicious  pleasures.  After 
working,  the  laborer  finds  it  easy  to  spend  his  spare  time  in 
heavy  drinking,  gambling  and  in  other  forms  of  vice.  The 
“Kitchin  Yado,”  or  cheap  workingmen’s  boarding  houses 
in  which  thousands  throng,  give  little  else  but  bestial  or 
degrading  amusements  for  the  inmates.  The  wretched 
women  of  the  neighborhood  are  on  hand  to  sell  themselves 
for  five  cents  or  more,  while  gambling  and  drinking  to- 


52 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


gether  with  venereal  diseases  take  a  terrible  toll  of  the 
stalwart  workers  of  the  industrial  district.1 

Working  with  such  wages,  hours  and  conditions,  it  is 
not  to  be  wondered  at  that  there  is  a  widespread  spirit  of 
unrest  spreading  among  Japan’s  patiently  toiling  multi¬ 
tudes.  The  infection  is  everywhere.  From  their  own  im¬ 
poverished  conditions,  from  the  daily  press,  from  the  In¬ 
ternational  Conference  of  Labor  at  Washington,  from  the 
stimulus  of  revolutionary  Russia,  from  labor  leaders  and 
agitators,  from  the  intellectuals,  professors  and  students 
in  the  universities,  from  the  very  atmosphere  of  the  time, 
unrest  is  spreading. 

As  a  result  of  this  growing  unrest  on  the  part  of  labor, 
there  were  three  or  four  hundred  strikes  a  year,  even  in  the 
hard  times  following  the  war.2  The  Japanese  laborer, 
though  usually  patient  and  hard  working,  when  aroused 
is  volcanic  in  temperament  like  the  molten  lava  underlying 
his  mountainous  islands.  This  was  manifested  in  the  sud¬ 
den  and  fierce  rice  riots  of  1918  when  some  300,000  took 
part  in  violent  demonstrations  against  the  high  cost  of 
living.  The  assassination  of  Mr.  Yasuda,  the  millionaire 
miser  and  profiteer,  and  of  Premier  Hara  also  showed  the 
temper  of  the  times. 


“Industrial  Conditions  in  Japan,”  p.  7. 


*  Strikes  in  Japan:  Cases 

1918  .  417 

1919  .  497 

Strikes  in  the  United  States: 

1918  .  3,248 

1919  .  3,444 

1920  .  3,109 


Japan  Year  Book,  1922,  p.  180;  World  Almanac,  1922,  p.  291. 

According  to  Article  17  of  the  Police  Order  of  1900,  which  is  still  in  force  in  Japan 
strikes  are  forbidden  and  all  acts  of  agitation  which  might  lead  to  a  strike  are  pun¬ 
ishable  by  imprisonment.  “Those  who,  with  the  object  of  causing  a  strike,  seduce 
or  incite  others  shall  be  sentenced  to  major  imprisonment  of  one  to  six  months  with 
additional  fines.”  A  closed  safety  valve  means  explosion;  autocracy  and  repression 
cause  revolution. 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


53 


The  strike  in  Kobe  in  1921  was  typical  of  the  new  spirit 
observable  after  the  war.  This  strike  was  led  by  the  Rever¬ 
end  T.  Kagawa,  perhaps  the  most  spiritual  pastor  in  Japan. 
He  himself  thus  describes  it:  “On  Sunday,  the  tenth  of 
July,  35,000  workmen  made  a  great  demonstration,  march¬ 
ing  in  a  procession  about  five  miles  long.  The  Kawaski 
and  Mitsubishi  Shipbuilding  Yards  did  indeed  at  last  put 
down  this  disturbance  by  closing  the  works  and  enlisting 
military  force,  but  it  required  the  exertions  of  two  battalions 
of  soldiers  and  four  thousand  police  for  its  suppression, 
when  for  the  first  time  in  Japan  blood  was  shed  in  this 
connection.  The  strike  failed,  but  the  sympathy  of  Japan 
was  with  the  strikers.  During  the  forty  days  that  the 
strike  lasted,  the  city  people  gladly  bought  wares  of  the 
six  thousand  peddlars  in  order  to  help  on  the  success  of  the 
strike;  and  they  set  out  thousands  of  pounds  of  ice  in 
front  of  their  shops  for  the  refreshment  of  the  strikers.  I 
was  sent  to  prison,  charged  with  the  crime  of  disturbance 
of  the  peace,  with  a  hundred  and  twenty  other  leaders.” 

The  workers’  program  comprised  in  the  main  these  con¬ 
ditions:  joint  control  of  workshops,  recognition  of  workers’ 
right  to  form  or  join  labor  unions,  collective  bargaining, 
adoption  of  an  8  hour  day,  increase  of  wages,  allowance  in 
case  of  dismissal,  etc.  Is  it  to  be  wondered  at  that  in  the 
midst  of  such  conditions  labor  has  struggled  to  organize? 
Today  the  majority  are  controlled  by  radical  leaders. 
Many  of  the  members  who  called  themselves  socialists  a 
few  years  ago  have  gone  over  to  the  radical  Third  Interna¬ 
tional  of  Russia.  At  the  presnt  time  there  are  about  forty 
radical  groups  in  and  around  Tokyo,  deeply  tinged  with  the 
ideas  of  revolution  and  influenced  by  Bolshevism. 

The  first  trade  unions  were  organized  some  forty  years 
ago  by  Christian  leaders  who  had  studied  in  foreign  lands. 
The  intellectuals  in  the  labor  movement  of  the  early  days 


54 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


have  been  supplanted  by  radical  workingmen  who  wish 
to  control  their  own  unions. 

The  police  law  of  1919  made  agitation  for  strikes  a  crime 
and  trade  unions  largely  collapsed.  They  are  still  unrecog¬ 
nized  and  unlawful,  but  the  steady  growth  of  public  opinion 
and  the  fear  of  violence  from  the  growing  spirit  of  unrest 
in  all  ranks  of  labor  has  restrained  the  authorities  from 
continued  oppression.  In  1920  the  Japan  Socialist  Feder¬ 
ation  was  formed  in  Tokyo  with  some  two  thousand  mem¬ 
bers.  This  year  the  socialist  groups  and  labor  unions  put 
on  a  parade,  which  was  not  opposed,  in  which  they  carried 
not  only  the  red  flags  of  socialism  but  also  six  black  flags 
of  anarchism. 

Economic  injustice  and  oppression  are  driving  the  under¬ 
paid  and  dissatisfied  masses  of  Japan  into  open  enmity 
against  the  existing  social  order.  At  present  it  is  estimated 
that  there  are  some  three  hundred  labor  organizations  with 
a  membership  of  365,700.  With  no  legal  status  the  unions 
when  subject  to  government  opposition  are  almost  power¬ 
less.  The  workers  rapidly  gather  for  a  strike  and  then 
hastily  disperse,  so  that  the  movement  at  times  seems 
checked.  But  this  is  only  on  the  surface.  Underneath 
there  is  a  strong  current  that  is  constantly  increasing  in 
volume  and  intensity.  The  strength  of  the  unions,  however, 
should  not  be  measured  by  members  but  by  the  fact  that 
there  is  a  class-consciousness  which  enables  them  to  unite 
to  strike  and  to  maintain  many  of  their  demands. 

Perhaps  we  can  best  visualize  and  realize  the  concrete 
situation  in  the  new  world  of  labor  in  Japan  from  the  life 
of  a  typical  leader.  In  the  heart  of  Kobe,  we  found  Toyo- 
hiko  Kagawa,  the  benefactor  of  the  poor,  the  friend  of  little 
children,  the  guide  of  labor,  the  organizer  of  the  despairing 
farmers,  the  arousing  conscience  of  a  satisfied  church,  the 
Saint  Francis  of  the  slums.  We  had  crossed  Japan  to  see 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


55 


him,  for  in  this  man  we  found  epitomized  the  new  Japan — 
liberal,  daring,  hopeful — but  grappling  with  the  terrific 
problems  of  crushing  economic  need  in  the  grinding  poverty 
of  the  industrial  revolution. 

At  first  he  was  unwilling  to  talk  about  himself,  but  in  the 
course  of  a  long  day  in  his  company  we  were  able  to  extract 
the  following  facts  regarding  his  life:  He  was  born  in  Kobe 
in  1888.  His  father  was  a  Japanese  official  who  had  squan¬ 
dered  his  inherited  fortune  and  died  when  Kagawa  was 
six  years  old.  He  was  then  adopted  by  his  rich  uncle  in 
whose  luxurious  home  the  boy  had  everything  he  could 
desire.  While  attending  school,  he  was  invited  to  join  a 
Bible  class  conducted  by  Dr.  H.  W.  Myers.  Gradually  the 
story  of  Jesus  the  Carpenter  of  Nazareth,  who  poured  out 
his  life  for  the  poor,  gripped  the  heart  of  this  young 
student.  When  he  told  his  uncle,  who  was  a  Shintoist,  that 
he  had  decided  to  become  a  Christian  he  was  instantly 
driven  from  the  house  penniless.  Dr.  Myers  then  took 
Kagawa  to  his  home  as  his  son.  During  his  course  of  study 
he  broke  down  with  tuberculosis.  Seeking  recovery  he  went 
to  live  in  the  hut  of  a  poor  fisherman  on  the  sea-shore. 
After  partial  recovery,  he  returned  to  school  and  then  went 
to  live  among  the  poor  in  the  slums.  When  asked  why  he 
decided  to  go  to  the  slums  when  he  had  tuberculosis,  with 
tears  in  his  eyes,  he  replied:  “I  thought  that  I  had  only  a 
few  years  to  live  and  I  wanted  to  do  all  I  could  in  that 
short  time  for  the  people  who  needed  me  most.” 

Dr.  Myers  says  of  Kagawa’s  work  in  the  slums:  “We 
felt  that  in  giving  him  permission  to  go  there  we  were 
signing  his  death  warrant,  but  he  would  take  no  refusal. 
He  lived  on  $1.50  a  month  and  the  rest  of  the  money  given 
for  his  support  and  all  else  that  came  into  his  hands  went 
to  help  the  poor  and  suffering  about  him.  He  gave  away 
all  his  clothes  except  what  he  had  on  his  back,  and  to 


56 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


provide  for  somebody  who  was  hungry  he  often  went  with¬ 
out  a  meal.  Strange  to  say  this  heroic  treatment  under  the 
blessing  of  God  cured  his  disease.  He  was  preaching  day 
and  night  during  these  years,  visiting  and  nursing  the  sick, 
studying  and  writing,  and  doing  the  work  of  six  ordinary 
men.” 

When  partially  recovered  from  sickness,  he  became  the 
pastor  of  a  little  church  in  Shinkawa,  Kobe.  After  spend¬ 
ing  four  years  in  this  district,  he  decided  to  go  to  America 
to  study.  When  the  writer  visited  Princeton  between 
1914-1916,  Kagawa  was  there  as  a  student.  Upon  his 
return  to  Japan  many  lucrative  positions  were  open  to  him. 
He  refused  them  all  and  returned  to  his  little  room  in  the 
slums  where  he  did  not  have  so  much  as  a  bed,  a  chair  or 
a  table.  The  writer  found  the  little  room  where  he  had 
lived  for  some  years  in  a  dark  and  filthy  alley.  But  in 
his  new  office  were  several  hundred  of  the  most  up-to-date 
books  on  every  phase  of  the  labor  movement,  sociology, 
politics,  art  and  religion. 

We  found  him  not  a  strong,  robust  man,  but  a  thin,  ema¬ 
ciated,  almost  pitiful  figure  kept  going  by  the  blazing  fire 
of  the  spirit  with  him.  He  was  wearing  a  suit  of  clothes 
that  would  cost  less  than  $1.50.  He  is  living  in  the  midst 
of  the  foulest  and  most  filthy  slum  we  have  ever  visited 
in  any  city  in  the  world. 

His  first  undertaking  was  to  organize  labor  in  order  to 
help  improve  their  terrible  conditions.  While  engaged  in 
the  work  of  a  pastor  in  his  little  church,  he  started  to  fight 
for  social  justice.  Here  in  the  industrial  districts  he  found 
women  working  from  twelve  to  seventeen  hours  a  day,  and 
receiving  a  daily  wage  of  from  twenty  to  fifty  cents.  With 
more  than  nine-tenths  of  the  laborers  receiving  less  than 
a  living  wage,  and  with  92  per  cent  of  the  families  of  Japan 
trying  to  keep  alive  on  less  than  $250.00  a  year,  he  set  to 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


57 


work  to  improve  these  appaling  conditions  of  poverty.  He 
did  not  ask  for  charity.  He  demanded  social  justice.  The 
majority  in  Church  or  State,  like  the  Priest  and  Levite, 
passed  by  on  the  other  side.  He  dared  to  face  the  facts. 
Through  his  paper,  the  ‘‘Labor  News,”  of  which  he  is  the 
editor  and  proprietor,  he  aroused  the  hope  of  the  despairing. 

Not  satisfield  with  working  for  the  cause  of  the  indus¬ 
trial  laborers,  he  began  to  organize  the  tenants  and  farmers 
in  the  agrarian  districts  where  conditions  were  even  worse. 
Farmers7  unions  were  started,  co-operative  societies  were 
organized  and  a  paper  was  published  to  give  the  farmers 
the  facts  regarding  the  agricultural  situation  in  Japan. 
With  the  awakening  of  the  womanhood  of  Japan,  he  intro¬ 
duced  a  third  newspaper  called  “The  New  Womanhood.77 

Kagawa  is  today  the  busiest  man  in  Japan.  During  the 
seven  years  since  the  writer  saw  him  in  Princeton,  he  has 
written  some  sixteen  books  and  pamphlets.  He  is  con¬ 
tributing  to  a  dozen  magazines  and  editing  three  news¬ 
papers.  He  continues  to  serve  as  pastor  of  the  little  church 
in  the  slums  where  he  conducts  services  before  six  o’clock 
in  the  morning  for  the  impoverished  congregation  before 
many  of  them  have  to  go  off  for  their  Sunday  of  merciless 
toil  in  a  non-Christian  country.  He  draws  his  own  illus¬ 
trations  and  pen  sketches  for  his  books  and  articles.  He 
is  at  present  preparing  a  novel  on  the  underworld  of  Osaka, 
like  Sheldons7  “In  His  Steps.”  He  has  also  been  conduct¬ 
ing  an  industrial  research  bureau  which  has  given  him  a 
unique  insight  into  the  industrial  situation  of  Japan. 

The  account  of  his  life  is  appearing  in  three  volumes. 
The  first  volume,  containing  the  story  of  his  conversion 
and  his  entry  into  the  fight  for  social  justice  for  the  poor, 
has  exhausted  more  than  two  hundred  editions,  and  accord¬ 
ing  to  the  publishers  has  been  read  by  more  than  a  million 
people.  When  he  is  announced  to  speak  the  largest  halls 


58 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


are  filled  to  overflowing.  Students  from  the  Imperial  Uni¬ 
versity  eagerly  crowd  the  meetings.  His  life  has  been 
“dramatized”  and  his  books  have  been  translated  into  sev¬ 
eral  languages.  He  is  earning  some  $15,000  a  year  by 
writing,  but  every  cent  is  invested  in  downtrodden  human¬ 
ity.  He  finances  a  free  hospital  and  dispensary  for  the 
poor,  and  a  dormitory  for  laborers  who  have  no  home. 
His  deepest  need  today  is  money  enough  to  build  a  social 
settlement  to  enable  him  to  make  a  demonstration  in  the 
midst  of  the  poverty  of  Japan,  such  as  Toynbee  Hall  in 
London  or  Hull  House  in  Chicago.  From  the  money  re¬ 
ceived  from  his  books,  he  has  already  given  more  than 
$40,000  for  the  help  of  the  impoverished  labor  movement, 
for  the  support  of  his  dispensary  and  for  the  assistance  of 
his  Japanese  fellow- workers  in  Japan,  Korea  and  Formosa. 
He  advocates  the  application  of  Christian  principles  to 
political,  social  and  industrial  evils.  Like  Mr.  Gandhi  of 
India,  Kagawa  is  a  pacifist  and  has  a  hatred  of  war.  He 
believes  in  evolution  rather  than  revolution,  expression  in 
place  of  repression,  and  in  the  power  of  vital  social  Chris¬ 
tianity  to  uplift  mankind.  He  believes  that  we  must 
Christianize  society  and  socialize  Christianity.  He  stands 
for  a  sane  constructive  policy  for  the  Japanese  labor  move¬ 
ment  in  place  of  the  radical  and  destructive  Bolshevist 
program  which  the  younger  and  more  ignorant  labor  leaders 
have  for  the  time  adopted. 

Kagawa  took  an  active  part  in  the  Kobe  strike  and  went 
to  prison  with  a  hundred  and  twenty  others.  He  has  been 
arrested  five  times  for  his  fearless  vindication  of  the  rights 
of  labor  and  for  articles  printed  in  his  newspapers.  In  the 
words  of  the  title  of  his  book,  he  is  living  “Beyond  the 
Death  Line.”  But  he  walks  joyous  and  unafraid. 

We  left  his  humble  home  burdened  with  the  patient  suf¬ 
fering  of  the  toiling  masses  in  the  noisome  pestilence  of 


THE  NEW  JAPAN 


59 


those  reeking  slums,  with  the  cries  of  little  children  still 
ringing  in  our  ears.  W7e  even  felt  sorry  for  a  dog  with  its 
feeble  bark  in  that  foul  air.  Not  dogs,  but  nine  million 
families  of  our  toiling  brothers  are  trying  to  sustain  life 
on  less  than  a  dollar  a  day  in  Japan,  which  is  now  one  of 
the  most  expensive  countries  in  Asia,  caught  in  the  grinding 
forces  of  the  modern  industrial  revolution,  between  the 
sweated  Orient  and  the  organized  wealth  of  the  Occident. 
Amid  the  clash  of  forces  old  and  new,  of  feudalism  and  in¬ 
dustrialism,  wealth  and  poverty,  autocracy  and  democracy, 
in  travail  of  soul  the  new  Japan  is  being  born. 


Chapter  III 

INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION 

After  visiting  the  principal  manufacturing  cities  of  India 
we  became  convinced  that  industrial  conditions  are  on  the 
whole  much  better  than  in  China,  where  the  struggle  for 
life  is  more  fierce  and  relentless.  The  life  of  the  average 
Indian  worker  is  conditioned  by  the  basic  fact  of  India’s 
greater  poverty,  for  it  is  the  poorest  country  in  the  world. 
The  per  capita  income  of  the  people  was  estimated  by 
Lord  Cromer  in  1882  as  27  rupees,  or  $9.00  a  year;  in  1900, 
in  Lord  Curzon’s  time,  it  was  estimated  at  30  rupees,  or 
$10.00.  The  Director  of  Statistics  for  India  now  reckons 
the  per  capita  income  as  53  rupees,  or  $17.66  a  year.  Thus 
the  average  income  of  this  entire  fifth  of  the  human  race 
is  less  than  five  cents  a  day. 

Such  a  statement  is  easily  written  or  read,  but  what 
does  it  mean  in  terms  of  human  life?  It  means  for  tens 
of  millions  in  India  perpetual  poverty  and  often  actual 
hunger.  It  means  one  or  at  most  two  scanty  meals  a  day 
of  millet  or  the  cheapest  grains;  it  means  an  earthern  floor 
and  four  mud  walls  of  a  little  one-room  hovel  for  a  large 
family  in  a  smoke-filled  room  with  no  chimney,  and  often 
no  bed,  table,  chair  or  stove.  It  means  that  without  ade¬ 
quate  industries  in  the  frequent  periods  of  drought  mil¬ 
lions  face  the  hunger  of  famine.  It  is  this  bitter  poverty 
that  drives  the  worker  from  the  land  in  times  of  scarcity  to 
the  dreaded  factories  of  Bombay  or  Calcutta,  and  from 
them  he  seeks  to  escape  whenever  his  poverty  permits. 

60 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION 


61 


The  terrible  prevalence  of  debt  tends  to  increase  this 
poverty.  In  one  place  which  we  visited  nine-tenths  of  the 
workers  were  reported  to  be  in  debt.  Much  of  this  is  pre¬ 
ventable,  incurred  in  unproductive  expenditures,  such  as  on 
marriage  ceremonies.  Sir  Daniel  Hamilton  well  says  that 
the  country  is  in  the  grip  of  the  money-lender.  “It  is 
usury — the  rankest,  most  extortionate,  most  merciless 
usury,  which  eats  the  marrow  out  of  the  raiyat  and  con¬ 
demns  him  to  a  life  of  penury  and  slavery.”  The  interest 
rate  varies  from  20  to  150  per  cent.  The  writer  found 
occasionally  even  higher  rates  among  the  drink-cursed 
miners  of  Bengal  on  short  term  loans  without  security. 

India  has  an  industrial  population  of  some  eight  mil¬ 
lions.  There  are  approximately  fourteen  million  people  en¬ 
gaged  in  primitive  or  cottage  industries  and  over  two  hun¬ 
dred  millions  in  agriculture.  In  5,312  modern  factories 
British  India  has  1,367,136  workers,  a  number  larger  than 
in  China  and  a  little  less  than  in  Russia  or  Japan.1 

After  considering  India's  poverty,  we  may  now  examine 
wages,  hours  and  conditions  of  labor.  According  to  the 
report  of  the  Government  Bureau  of  Statistics,  the  wages 
of  the  majority  of  common  laborers  were  from  8  to  14  cents 
a  day,  of  carpenters  and  iron  workers  16  to  49  cents,  of  cot¬ 
ton  weavers  8  to  49  cents  and  of  rural  workers  4  to  20 
cents  a  day.2 

1  The  Director  of  Statistics  reports  1,367,136  workers  in  5,312  large  industrial 
establishments  in  1922.  According  to  the  Census  there  are  2,106,000  in  industrial 
plants  and  mines  employing  20  persons  or  more;  2,400,000  transport  workers,  and 
825,000  workers  in  subsidiary  occupations.  Professor  Gini  estimates  2,000,000  labor¬ 
ers  in  establishments  employing  less  than  20  persons,  or  a  total  industrial  population 
of  approximately  8,000,000.  There  are  approximately  222,000,000  gainfully  employed, 
compared  with  41,609,192  in  the  United  States,  and  295,000,000  in  China  according 
to  the  estimate  of  the  Government  Bureau  of  Economic  Information,  Peking. 

2  A  careful  investigation  conducted  by  the  Labor  Office  of  the  Bombay  Govern¬ 
ment  among  194,000  workers  in  the  cotton  industry,  revealed  the  following  facts: 
The  majority  of  the  men  when  we  saw  them,  when  wages  were  still  aUthe  peak  fol¬ 
lowing  the  war,  earned  from  24  to  50  cents  a  day;  women  earned  from  24  to  33  cents; 


62 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


In  North  and  South  India  we  found  skilled  artisans,  car¬ 
penters,  masons,  bricklayers,  blacksmiths,  weavers  and  en¬ 
gine  drivers  receiving  from  $8.00  to  $12.00  a  month.  In 
the  coal  mines  of  Bengal  we  found  unskilled  labor  paid  10 
cents  a  day  for  women,  12  cents  for  men.  The  average 
earned  by  miners  in  one  mine  was  $1.49  a  week;  but  they 
only  cared  to  work  three  days  a  week.  In  Cawnpore  we 
found  men  working  for  18  cents  a  day,  women  for  9  to  13 
cents  and  children  for  8  cents  a  day. 

We  cannot  forget  the  sight  of  some  of  these  children  who 
were  under  age  toiling  in  the  heat,  half  suffocated  by  the 
stifling  dust  of  the  tan  bark,  in  a  shoe  factory  which  has 
made  large  profits  and  has  done  nothing  for  its  labor.  A 
neighboring  mill  has  declared  120  per  cent  profit,  paying 
many  of  its  women  10  cents  a  day,  and  unskilled  men  16 
cents  a  day.  Last  year  57  per  cent  of  the  children  of  these 
workers  in  Cawnpore  died  during  the  first  year  of  their 
impoverished  lives;  that  is,  570  per  thousand  of  these  poor 
children  died  during  the  first  year,  compared  to  83  per 
thousand  during  the  same  year  in  favored  England.* 1  In 
the  model  village  furnished  by  one  company  the  lives  of 
232  children  per  thousand  are  saved  a  year,  but  the  major¬ 
ity  of  the  employers  seem  to  view  with  suspicion  any  sug¬ 
gestion  of  such  welfare  work  or  housing  for  their  workers. 

the  majority  of  the  children  in  Ahmedabad  earned  from  8  to  16  cent*,  and  in  Sholapur 
less  than  8  cents  a  day.  Bombay  Labor  Gazette,  January,  1923,  p.  15. 

The  Government  Report  of  the  Central  Provinces  for  June  30,  1922,  shows  rura 
wages  ranged  from  8  cents  a  day  for  unskilled  to  33  cents  for  skilled  workers  j  urban 
wages  from  12  to  49  cents  with  an  average  of  less  than  S3. 00  a  month.  The  Report 
for  the  Madras  Presidency  shows  practically  the  same  wage  scale.  An  inquiry  by 
Dr.  Gilbert  Slater  in  Madras  states  that  the  cost  of  living  at  the  close  of  the  war  was 
$5.66  a  month  for  a  family  of  four.  Other  inquiries  after  the  prices  had  risen  esti¬ 
mated  a  minimum  budget  for  a  family  of  four  at  $8.00,  or  considerably  above  the 
average  wage  received  in  that  Presidency. 

1  Many  women  leave  the  city  for  their  country  home  for  their  confinement.  If  the 
child  dies  after  its  return  to  the  city  it  is  registered  among  the  deaths  but  not  among 
the  births,  thus  increasing  the  apparent  death  rate.  The  actual  death  rate  is  dis¬ 
gracefully  high,  but  not  as  bad  as  these  figures  would  seem  to  indicate. 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION 


63 


Let  us  examine  for  a  moment  this  wage  scale! in  India  in 
the  light  of  profits  and  the  ability  of  employers  to  pay  a 
living  wage.  During  the  hard  times  over  most  of  the  world 
in  1922,  the  mills  of  Bombay  on  an  investment  of  some 
$40,000,000  made  a  profit  of  over  $50,000,000,  or  an  aver¬ 
age  of  125  per  cent.  The  year  before  they  made  a  profit 
of  over  170  per  cent.  These  were  certainly  exceptional 
years,  but  in  the  meantime  their  wage  scale  for  all  workers 
averaged  only  $10.00  a  month,  or  33  cents  a  day.  Many 
of  the  mills  of  Western  India  are  now  demanding  a  reduc¬ 
tion  of  this  wage  scale.  Is  the  profit  of  the  single  manu¬ 
facturer  or  the  welfare  of  the  thousands  of  these  stunted 
personalities  of  greater  moment? 

A  foreign  cotton  mill  in  a  city  in  the  South  of  India 
visited  by  the  writer,  after  having  made  far  more  than  200 
per  cent  profit  last  year,  paid  from  18  to  33  cents  a  day 
for  unskilled  labor,  and  from  $11.00  to  $21.00  a  month  for 
skilled  workers.  A  thousand  boys  and  a  thousand  girls 
are  working  here  at  from  16  to  24  cents  a  day.  The  com¬ 
pany  does  not  believe  in  any  welfare  work  and  has  dis¬ 
couraged  trade  unions  or  any  effort  of  the  people  to  im¬ 
prove  their  miserable  condition.  Which  is  more  important, 
that  a  few  foreign  employers  should  retire  with  a  comfort¬ 
able  income  for  life,  or  that  the  more  than  two  hundred 
million  toilers  in  India  should  receive  a  living  wage? 

On  the  whole  we  found  that  the  foreign  firms  pay  better 
wages  and  provide  better  working  conditions  than  most  of 
the  Indian  employers.  In  one  Indian  cotton  mill  which  we 
inspected  we  found  they  were  paying  their  skilled  labor 
$8.00  a  month,  unskilled  workers  $5.00  and  boys  $3.00  a 
month,  plus  a  temporary  grant  of  seventy- five  per  cent  for 
increased  cost  of  living,  while  their  printed  balance  sheet 
showed  a  profit  of  200  per  cent. 

In  the  issue  of  “Capital”  for  February  15,  1923,  dividends 


64  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

for  certain  Bombay  cotton  mills  during  the  exceptionally 
favorable  years  1921  and  1920  are  declared  as  follows: 

1921  1920 

Per  cent  Per  cent 

Currimbhoy  Ebrahim  &  Sons,  Crescent  Mil] ....  100  110 

W.  H.  Brady  &  Co.  Ltd.,  New  City,  Bombay. . .  100  160 


Tata  Sons  Ltd.,  Svadeshi .  110  120 

Ramnarain  Harnandrai  &  Sons,  Phoenix .  175  160 

Morarjee  Goculdas  &  Co.,  Sholapoor .  250  200 

D.  M.  Petit  Sons  &  Co.,  Manockjee  Petit .  270  65 


In  the  same  publication  the  jute  mills  of  Bengal  de¬ 
clared  dividends  as  follows  for  1919, 1  some  being  almost  as 
high  and  some  higher  for  1920: 

Per  cent 
1919 


Bird  &  Co.,  Lawrence  Mill .  200 

Jardine,  Skinner  &  Co.,  Kanknarrah .  200 

Gillanders  Arbuthnot,  Hooghly  Mills .  200 

McLeod  &  Co.,  Kelvin  Mill . .  225 

F.  W.  Heilgers  &  Co.,  Kennison .  250 

Macneill  &  Co.,  Ganges  Mill .  270 

Barry  &  Co.,  Gourepore .  420 


The  F.  W.  Heilgers  &  Co/s  Kennison  mills  declared  the 
following  dividends  for  the  five  years  from  1916  through 
1920: 


1916 

1917 

1918 

1919 

1920 


Per  cent 
..  110 
..  200 
..  250 
. .  250 
..  400 


What  share  in  these  enormous  profits  has  the  poor  mill 
worker  or  jute  cultivator  received?  “The  inarticulate 
peasant  himself  has  to  work  in  the  fields  during  the  mon¬ 
soon,  often  standing  waist  deep  in  the  water.  He  is  satu¬ 
rated  with  malaria  in  these  mosquito-ridden  districts,  and 


1  “In  the  years  1914-1920  the'jute  shares  in  one  company  went  up  from  145  to  1,160. 
The  interest  paid  on  the  capital  invested  in  the  company  went  up  from  15  per  cent 
before  the  war  to  160  per  cent.  But  the  price  paid  to  the  jute  cultivator  went  down, 
from  $4.50  before  the  war  to  $2.00  in  the  year  1920.”  C.  F.  Andrews,  "Christ  and 
Labour,”  pp.  43-45. 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION  65 

the  continual  dampness  brings  on  ague,  rheumatism  and 
fever.  All  round  his  village  he  has  to  bear  the  stench  of 
rotting  jute  fibre,  the  stagnation  of  standing  pools  of  water, 
and  a  hundred  other  evils.  .  .  .  Directors  of  jute  com¬ 

panies  have  been  congratulating  their  shareholders  on 
bumper  dividends,  and  not  a  hint  has  been  given  in  their 
glowing  reports  about  the  condition  of  peasantry  from 
whom  those  dividends  were  extr acted.”1 

We  visited  certain  typical  jute  mills  near  Calcutta.  In 
one  we  found  excellent  conditions  and  an  honest  effort  for 
the  welfare  of  the  workers.  In  another  we  found  very  dif¬ 
ferent  conditions.  The  Indian  workers  were  driven  here 
by  hunger  and  would  escape  back  to  their  impoverished  vil¬ 
lages  if  they  could.  Most  of  the  Europeans  were  here  to 
make  money  and  get  out  of  India  as  soon  as  they  could. 
The  mill  seemed  a  penal  settlement  for  both.  In  the  light 
of  recent  and  present  profits  the  wages  seemed  pathetically 
small.  Unskilled  men  were  receiving  $1.00  a  week,  women 
82  cents  and  boys  57  cents  a  week;  coolies  were  paid  20 
cents  a  day.  The  young  European  who  showed  us  over  the 
factory  naively  informed  us  that  they  “managed  to  break 
up  all  the  unions”  which  the  men  tried  to  form  to  improve 
their  miserable  condition.  This  European  spoke  with  con¬ 
tempt  of  the  workers.  “They  have  to  be  driven,”  he  said. 

In  the  roar  and  dust  of  the  driving  machinery  we  saw  the 
dull  toilers  plodding  at  their  work.  They  are  handicapped 
by  tropical  heat,  hookworm,  illiteracy,  poor  pay,  bad  hous¬ 
ing  and  the  low  moral  conditions  reported  by  the  inspecting 
lady  doctor  in  these  jute  mills.  Not  they,  but  the  machines 
and  the  money  behind  them  are  masters  here.  There  lies 
a  baby  of  one  of  the  working  mothers  asleep  on  the  floor  in 
the  din  and  dust.  What  chance  will  this  child  have  in  life? 
It  may  grow  up  to  aspire  to  earn  a  dollar  a  week  in  this 


1  Ibid.  pp.  43-45. 


66 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


mill.  It  will  join  the  thirty  million  children  and  youth 
already  in  India  for  whom  there  is  no  school.  What  chance 
have  these  women  and  children,  or  these  helpless  unor¬ 
ganized  men  against  the  vast  forces  of  the  industrial  revo¬ 
lution  in  India?  But,  still,  “they  must  be  driven.”  How 
long?  How  long  will  they  stand  it?  Crushed  humanity 
even  in  obedient  India,  China  and  Japan  is  turning  at  last. 
The  days  of  the  fleecing  of  labor  for  the  profiteer  are  num¬ 
bered,  thank  God,  all  over  the  world. 

We  desire  to  bear  testimony  to  the  fine  spirit  of  many 
employers.  Some  of  them  showed  an  attitude  not  only  of 
fairness,  but  of  real  human  concern  for  their  workers. 

Regarding  hours  of  w^ork,  at  the  beginning  of  the  Indian 
factory  system,  the  working  time  lasted  from  sunrise  to 
sunset,  or  about  12  hours.  The  Factory  Act  of  1921  lim¬ 
ited  work  to  a  maximum  of  11  hours  a  day  or  60  hours  a 
week,  with  6  hours  for  children  from  12  to  15  years  of  age, 
and  one  day’s  rest  in  seven.  Unlike  China  very  few 
modern  mills  in  India  have  any  night  work.  An  inquiry 
showed  the  actual  average  working  time  in  the  mills  of 
Bombay  at  present  was  ten  hours  a  day  for  men  and 
women,  and  about  five  hours,  or  half  time,  for  children 
from  12  to  15  years  of  age.  When  we  contrast  this  with 
the  frequently  inhuman  hours  of  unprotected  labor  in 
China,  and  even  with  conditions  in  some  of  the  backward 
states  of  America,  we  see  how  far  advanced  India  is  in  her 
labor  legislation.  Several  leading  manufacturers  testified 
that  labor  in  India  is  now  producing  more  in  10  hours  of 
work  than  it  did  formerly  on  12  or  14  hours. 

There  are  several  evils  which  exist  in  India  that  greatly 
affect  conditions  of  labor.  The  system  of  forced  labor  so 
widespread  under  Indian  zemindars  and  native  princes  in 
certain  parts  of  the  country  has  been  mitigated,  and  in 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION  67 

most  parts  of  India  abolished,  under  the  British  Govern¬ 
ment. 

An  even  worse  practice  was  the  recruiting  of  immigrants 
under  the  system  of  indentured  labor  to  go  abroad.  The 
plan  of  contract,  loans  and  debt  often  reduced  the  poor 
coolies  to  a  practical  state  of  peonage  in  some  colonies.  It 
was  the  long  battle  for  the  rights  of  the  oppressed  Indians 
in  South  Africa  that  led  Mr.  Gandhi  repeatedly  to  go  to 
prison  with  his  fellow-countrymen  until  they  won  more 
humane  treatment.  The  revelation  of  the  immoral  and  in¬ 
human  conditions  made  by  Mr.  C.  F.  Andrews  and  others 
in  Fiji  and  other  colonies  finally  led  to  the  proclamation  of 
the  Viceroy  on  May  25,  1917,  that  the  indenture  system 
of  Indian  labor  had  been  finally  abolished.  The  whole 
question  of  emigration  has  now  been  delegated  to  the  In¬ 
dian  Legislative  Assembly.1 

There  is  also  the  opium  evil  affecting  Indian  labor  in 
some  parts  of  the  country.  After  investigating  the  indus¬ 
tries  of  Bombay,  Dr.  Barnes  reports  to  the  Government, 
‘The  universal  usage  of  opium  in  Bombay.  Ninety-eight 
per  cent  of  the  infants  born  to  women  industrial  workers 
have  opium  administered  to  them.  .  .  .  This  is  used  as 

a  household  remedy  for  every  ailment  of  infancy  and  child¬ 
hood.  .  .  .  The  great  necessity  for  the  control  of  the 

sale  of  opium,  which  is  a  poison,  is  indicated.”2 

The  poor  working  mother  who  leaves  her  baby  alone  for 
the  day  before  going  to  the  mill  gives  the  child  an  opium 
pill  to  keep  it  torpid  or  asleep  during  her  absence.  We 
even  found  these  ignorant  mothers,  where  in  rare  instances 

1  The  Fiji  Government  Medical  Report  of  1916,  Council  Paper,  No.  54,  revealed  the 
whole  immoral  system  in  its  statement:  “When  one  indentured  Indian  woman  has 
to  serve  three  men  as  well  as  numerous  outsiders,  the  results,  as  regards  syphilis  and 

gonorrhea,  cannot  be  doubted.” 

2  Bombay  Labor  Gazette,  September,  1922,  pp.  31,  32. 


68 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


creches  were  provided  for  the  care  of  the  children,  feeding 
the  children  opium  each  morning  on  general  principles,  even 
though  the  children  were  to  be  kept  under  the  care  of  a 
trained  nurse.3 

A  further  fact  which  handicaps  Indian  labor  is  the  almost 
universal  illiteracy.  There  are  approximately  8,500,000 
in  school  in  India  and  30,000,000  without  schooling.  That 
is,  3.4  per  cent  of  the  population  is  in  school,  compared 
to  over  20  per  cent  in  America.  It  is  officially  stated  that 
39  per  cent  of  the  children  educated  in  India  lapse  into 
illiteracy  within  five  years  after  leaving  school.4  The  vast 
bulk  of  the  workers  are  totally  illiterate.  This  must  be 
altered  if  their  condition  is  to  be  improved.  There  is  deep 
need  of  a  progressive  movement  for  universal  education 
among  the  young  and  for  a  Workers’  Education  Movement 
similar  to  that  in  England  among  adults. 

The  housing  of  the  workers  is  a  serious  problem  in  India. 
We  found  the  worst  conditions  in  Bombay  among  the 
“chawls”  or  dark  tenements  of  the  workers.  The  official 
report  of  the  inspection  by  the  lady  doctor  to  the  Govern¬ 
ment  says:  “For  some  14  hours  of  the  24,  the  family  in¬ 
hale  an  atmosphere  laden  with  smoke  and  other  impuri¬ 
ties.  Nearly  every  chawl  contained  animals  such  as  goats, 
fowls,  cats  and  in  some  cases  monkeys.  Rats  were  also  in 
evidence  in  most  rooms  visited.  ...  I  have  several 

*  “The  Drink  and  Opium  Evil,”  C.  F.  Andrews,  pp.  3-13.  He  writes,  “It  was  the 
usual  practice  to  poison  the  little  babies  with  the  opium  drug  in  order  to  keep  them 
asleep  while  the  poor  mothers  went  out  and  worked  in  the  factories.  Two  of  the  best 
social  workers  in  Bombay  had  told  me  that  95  per  cent  of  the  mothers  were  obliged, 
in  this  distress  and  poverty,  to  drug  their  own  little  children;  and  the  workers  who 
went  to  visit  them  saw  these  ‘opium  babies’  with  their  wizened  faces,  looking  prema¬ 
turely  old.  The  practice  of  the  daily  pill  led  to  bowel  complaints  at  the  very  beginning 
of  life,  which  could  never  be  got  rid  of  afterwards  .  .  .  The  Government  had 

refused  to  shut  up  one  opium  shop  in  a  poor  slum  in  Calcutta  when  petitioned  to  do 
so,  because  (this  was  the  stated  reason  of  the  Excise  Officer)  2,300  people  frequented 
it  daily.”  Young  India,  1923,  p.  235. 

♦Progress  of  Education  in  India,  1912-1917,  p.  122. 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION 


69 


times  verified  the  overcrowding  of  rooms.  In  one  room,  on 
the  second  floor  of  a  chawl,  measuring  some  15  feet  by  12 
feet,  I  found  six  families  living.  Six  separate  ovens  on  the 
floor  proved  this  statement.  On  enquiry  I  ascertained  that 
the  actual  number  of  adults  and  children  living  in  this 
room  was  thirty.  .  .  .  Three  out  of  six  women  who 

lived  in  this  room  were  shortly  expecting  to  be  delivered. 
.  .  .  When  I  questioned  the  District  Nurse,  who  accom¬ 

panied  me,  as  to  how  she  would  arrange  for  privacy  in  this 
room,  I  was  shown  a  small  space  some  3  feet  by  4  feet 
which  was  usually  screened  off  for  the  purpose.  The  at¬ 
mosphere  at  night  of  that  room  filled  with  smoke  from 
the  six  ovens,  and  other  impurities,  would  certainly  physi¬ 
cally  handicap  any  woman  and  infant,  both  before  and 
after  delivery.  This  was  one  of  many  such  rooms  I  saw.”* 1 

More  than  a  fifth  of  the  single  rooms  in  Bombay  contain 
from  six  to  nine  persons,  over  13  per  cent  have  ten  or  more 
persons  in  each  room.  The  appalling  death  rate  in  these 
overcrowded,  one-room  tenements  of  Bombay,  is  shown  by 
the  returns  of  the  Health  Officer,  Dr.  J.  Sandilands.  In 
1921,  666  of  every  1,000  babies  died  during  the  first  year  of 
their  lives  in  Bombay.2  During  the  same  year,  1921,  in 
England  83  infants  per  thousand  died  under  one  year  of 
age.  Let  us  notice  the  effect  of  overcrowding  upon  infant 
mortality  during  the  first  year  of  life  in  Bombay  in  1921: 

Deaths 
Per  1,000 


Living  in  1  room  tenements .  828.5 

Living  in  2  room  tenements .  321.9 

Living  in  3  room  tenements .  191.4 

Living  in  4  or  more  room  tenements .  133.3 

In  England . 83.0 


1  Bombay  Labor  Gazette,  September,  1922,  p.  31. 

1  Allowance  must  be  made  for  mothers  whose  children  are  born  in  the  country  and 

who  return  to  the  city  after  childbirth,  thus  deereasing  Jthe  apparent  birth  and  in¬ 
creasing  the  death  rate. 


70 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


That  is,  of  every  thousand  babies  born  in  England  during 
that  year  83  died  and  917  lived.  In  the  one-room  tene¬ 
ments  of  Bombay,  according  to  the  necessarily  incomplete 
returns,  172  lived  and  828  died.  In  other  words,  several 
hundred  of  every  thousand  children  in  these  tenements  were 
sacrificed  to  existing  conditions  of  life  and  labor.  In  Bom¬ 
bay  73  per  cent  of  the  workers’  children  were  born  in  these 
one-room  tenements,  while  only  one  per  cent  were  born  in 
families  living  in  four  or  more  rooms.  It  was  in  Bombay 
that  the  average  profits  of  the  mills  were  170  per  cent  in 
1921.1 

Does  it  matter  if  a  few  hundred  children  “per  thousand” 
live  or  die?  What  is  it  that  really  matters?  Is  it  the  profit 
of  the  few  or  the  lives  of  the  many?  Here  are  five  hundred 
and  seventy  millions  of  industrial  and  agricultural  toilers 
in  India,  China  and  Japan  living  on  a  bare  subsistence, 
often  in  illiteracy  and  ignorance,  without  culture  or  com¬ 
fort,  lacking  almost  all  that  makes  life  rich  or  abundant 
for  us.  Yet  there  are  those  who  bitterly  resent  any  such 
inquiry  as  this  or  any  effort  to  alter  or  improve  these  condi¬ 
tions.  To  what  depths  of  sordid  selfishness  and  hypocrisy 
have  we  sunk  if  we  fight  to  maintain  such  conditions  and 
to  prevent  all  efforts  for  amelioration  or  radical  change  be¬ 
cause  of  our  vested  interests?  On  these  great  social  and 
industrial  issues  we  must  take  our  stand  with  those  who 
are  for  humanity  or  against  it;  with  those  who  are  for  God 
or  for  mammon. 

Living  with  such  wages  and  under  such  conditions  it  is 
not  surprising  that  labor  in  India  is  inefficient.  The  pro- 

1  Fortunately  the  Bombay  Government  has  a  housing  scheme  to  provide  for  50,000 
tenants  in  eight  years.  The  first  ones  completed  which  we  inspected  were,  however, 
very  far  from  satisfactory.  The  finest  provisions  we  found  in  India  for  the  housing 
of  the  workers  were  furnished  by  the  Tata  Iron  and  Steel  Works  at  Tatanagar,  which 
had  invested  over  $2,300,000  on  housing  for  12,000  workers;  the  British  India  Cor¬ 
poration  of  Cawnpore;  and  the  Buckingham  and  Carnatic  Mills  of  Madras. 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION 


71 


ductivity  of  the  individual  worker  in  textile  and  several 
other  industries  is  estimated  at  about  one-third  that  of 
British  labor.  The  causes  of  this  inefficiency  seem  to  be 
the  following:  Physically,  there  is  the  enervation  of  a 
tropical  climate,  undernourishment,  bad  housing,  often  poor 
ventilation  and  bad  working  conditions  in  the  factories, 
with  the  prevalence  of  hookworm,  malaria  and  other  de¬ 
bilitating  diseases.  Mentally,  there  is  the  illiteracy  and 
find  themselves  in  a  new  environment,  under  strange  con¬ 
ditions  sometimes  result  in  the  practice  of  drink,  gambling 
and  immorality.  Many  of  the  men  are  living  in  over¬ 
crowded  tenements  away  from  their  families,  with  their 
natural  instincts  repressed.  The  migratory  character  of 
Indian  labor  also  makes  for  inefficiency.  The  villagers 
find  themselves  in  a  new  environment,  under  strange  con¬ 
ditions,  in  a  job  that  is  galling  and  irksome.  This,  coupled 
with  low  wages,  bad  housing  and  labor  unrest,  accounts  for 
the  large  turnover  of  labor  in  nearly  all  industries.  Em¬ 
ployers  of  long  experience  whom  we  consulted,  however, 
agreed  that  Indian  labor  was  capable  of  great  improvement 
and  had  already  advanced  in  efficiency  in  recent  years. 

The  condition  of  women  and  children  in  labor  in  India 
calls  for  special  consideration.  Dr.  Barnes  in  her  report 
speaks  of  their  state  of  fatigue  when  forced  to  work  ten 
hours  while  standing,  and  then  walking  the  long  journey 
to  their  homes  where  they  have  all  their  own  housework 
to  do.  Only  a  few  mills  provide  maternity  benefits  before 
or  after  childbirth,  and  few  have  creches  for  the  care  of  the 
children  who  must  play  about  the  floor  of  the  factory,  or 
in  some  sections  of  the  country  are  given  opium  and  left 
uncared  for  at  home.  The  vast  majority  of  the  mills  have 
no  welfare  work  whatever  and  when  the  weekly  wage  is 
paid  feel  no  further  obligation  for  their  employees.  One  of 
the  deplorable  features  connected  with  the  employment  of 


72 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


women  in  industry  is  the  immorality  which  the  system 
entails.  The  power  of  the  foremen  and  middle-men  in  some 
mills  enables  them  to  make  immoral  overtures  which  if 
refused  may  lead  to  dismissal.  The  shortage  of  houses, 
overcrowding,  poverty  and  the  absence  of  so  many  of  the 
workers  from  their  village  homes  increase  the  moral  prob¬ 
lem. 

The  Report  of  the  Mine  Inspector  in  1921  showed  that 
there  were  249,663  mine  workers  among  whom  there  were 
91,949  women  and  8,548  children  under  12  years  of  age. 
Some  of  the  worst  conditions  we  found  in  India  were  in  the 
most  backward  mines  of  Bengal.  One  is  reminded  of 
recorded  conditions  of  labor  in  England  before  1842,  when 
women  were  finally  excluded  from  underground  labor.  It 
was  then  customary  for  women  and  children  to  drag  tubs 
of  coal  by  a  girdle  and  chain,  like  horses,  a  total  of  from 
seven  to  nine  miles  daily.  Even  pregnant  women  had  to 
work  in  dark,  unventilated,  undrained  mines.  The  moral 
effect  was  degrading  and  dehumanizing. 

Conditions  have  already  been  improved  by  Government 
legislation  in  India,  but  there  are  still  tens  of  thousands 
of  women  in  India,  China  and  Japan  who  could  re-echo  the 
sentiments  of  Isabella  Hogg  of  Scotland  in  1841  when  she 
said:  “Tell  Queen  Victoria  that  we  are  quiet,  loyal  sub¬ 
jects;  women-people  here  don’t  mind  work;  but  they  object 
to  horse  work.” 

After  considering  the  profits  of  many  employers  and  the 
wages  and  conditions  of  the  workers,  it  is  not  to  be  won¬ 
dered  at  that  there  is  a  growing  evidence  of  labor  unrest  in 
India.  Indeed  what  human  being,  except  a  profiteer,  could 
wish  them  to  be  contented?  Sir  Thomas  Holland,  speaking 
in  the  Imperial  Legislative  Council,  declared  he  wrould 
rather  see  the  mill  industry  of  Bombay  wiped  out  than  ac¬ 
cept  the  perpetuation  of  the  conditions  which  had  goaded 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION  73 

the  workers  to  their  last  great  strike.  Labor  unrest  is  the 
first  hope  of  improvement.  During  the  typical  years  of 
1921  there  were  341  strikes  and  industrial  disputes  reported, 
or  about  the  same  number  as  in  Japan.  Of  these  110  were 
won  by  the  workers  and  225  were  unsuccessful  or  indefinite 
in  their  terms  of  settlement. 

Before  the  war,  conditions  in  many  mills  in  Ahmedabad 
and  elsewhere  were  intolerable.  Abusive  language  and 
sometimes  thrashing  were  resorted  to.  In  1917  the  poor 
workers  struck.  Again  in  1918  the  Ahmedabad  weavers 
and  10,000  workers  under  the  leadership  of  their  townsman, 
Mr.  Gandhi,  went  on  a  long  strike  which  was  finally  settled 
by  arbitration.  The  great  strike  in  the  textile  factories  of 
Bombay  in  1920,  which  began  as  a  lockout,  was  entered 
into  by  over  150,000  workmen  though  ignorant  and  unor¬ 
ganized.  India,  like  Japan  and  China,  was  feeling  the 
influence  of  the  universal  upheaval  in  the  labor  world  after 
the  war.  The  employers  failed  to  realize  the  new  spirit 
of  the  workers.  The  men  were  driven  by  the  goading  sense 
of  injustice,  the  pinch  of  hunger  for  many,  the  squalor  and 
misery  of  their  surroundings,  exhausting  drudgery  and  lack 
of  personal  touch  between  the  employers  and  the  em¬ 
ployed.  One  mine  superintendent  said  to  the  writer:  “I 
can’t  beat  the  men  as  I  once  did.  There  is  a  new  spirit 
among  the  workers  since  Gandhi  appeared.  For  two  years 
I  have  not  dared  lay  hands  on  a  man.  If  you  beat  one 
now,  a  hundred  others  will  go  for  you.  The  workers  have 
been  quite  spoiled  by  this  new  movement.” 

The  year  1921  witnessed  a  remarkable  growth  of  the 
Trade  Union  Movement  throughout  India  and  the  world. 
Mr.  N.  M.  Joshi  of  Bombay,  the  able  labor  representative 
in  the  Legislative  Assembly,  places  the  present  number  of 
Trade  Unions  in  all  India  at  about  150  and  their  member¬ 
ship  at  nearly  200,000.  It  is  impossible  to  state  numbers 


74 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


with  accuracy  as  many  of  the  unions,  owing  to  their 
poverty,  ignorance,  lack  of  experience  and  absence  of 
indigenous  labor  leadership  are  little  more  than  strike  com¬ 
mittees.  When  we  visited  the  Government  Labor  Office 
in  Bombay  in  1923  we  found  five  blue  flags  locating  on  the 
map  the  five  strikes  then  in  progress.  Only  three  weeks 
during  the  previous  ten  months  had  been  free  from  strikes 
in  that  city. 

There  is  almost  a  complete  absence  in  India  of  radical 
and  especially  of  Bolshevik  influence  which  one  finds  in 
Japan  and  China.  A  wise  and  generous  attitude  on  the 
part  of  the  Government  and  employers  may  win  the  whole 
movement  to  a  fair  policy  of  constitutional  co-operation, 
while  a  selfish  and  reactionary  policy  will  drive  it  toward 
radicalism  as  in  other  countries. 

The  Trade  Union  Movement  is  in  its  infancy  in  India 
and  the  great  mass  of  the  workers  are  too  illiterate  and 
untrained  to  be  leaders.  During  this  period  many  bar¬ 
risters,  philanthropists  and  others  are  leading  the  move¬ 
ment.  These  men  are  of  two  kinds:  interested  and  disin¬ 
terested.  Self-appointed  labor  leaders  who  are  seeking 
personal  notoriety  are  not  only  exploiting  labor  but  deeply 
wronging  this  needy  cause  and  bringing  it  into  ill  repute. 

On  the  other  hand  we  cannot  agree  with  the  employers, 
like  those  of  several  other  countries  we  have  visited,  who 
refuse  to  see  or  recognize  any  but  their  own  employees. 
Labor  is  now  in  a  vicious  circle  of  low  wages,  illiteracy  and 
unorganized  helplessness.  If  we  wait  till  labor  is  able  to 
furnish  its  own  leadership  for  how  many  generations  will 
it  be  exploited?  The  employers  are  strongly  organized  and 
financed  and  they  can  afford  the  best  legal  counsel.  Are 
the  impotent  workers  alone  to  be  denied  all  help  from  out¬ 
side? 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION  75 

Article  427  of  the  Peace  Treaty,  to  which  India  was  a 
signatory,  lays  down  “the  right  of  association  for  all  law¬ 
ful  purposes  by  the  employed  as  well  as  by  the  employers.” 
The  right  of  collective  bargaining  and  trade  union  organi¬ 
zation  has  long  been  recognized  in  Great  Britain.1 

Lord  Reading  in  September,  1922,  said:  “We  hope  to 
place  our  considered  decision  regarding  the  protection  and 
legal  status  of  trade  unions  before  you.”  In  considering 
the  question  of  labor  legislation,  full  credit  should  be  given 
to  the  Government  of  India  for  its  wise  and  generous  policy 
for  the  protection  of  labor.  India  was  almost  the  first 
country  in  the  world  to  ratify  the  action  of  the  Washing¬ 
ton  Labor  Conference.  No  other  country  has  been  more 
responsive  to  world  public  opinion  regarding  industrial  con¬ 
ditions  or  has  more  improved  its  labor  legislation  since  the 
war.  In  the  debates  in  the  Council  of  State  in  Delhi,  we 
heard  repeated  assurances  of  India's  loyalty  to  the  Labor 
Organization  of  the  League  of  Nations.  India  has  far  sur¬ 
passed  Japan  and  has  set  a  shining  example  to  China  in 
her  labor  legislation. 

The  outstanding  achievements  of  India's  industrial  legis¬ 
lation  since  the  war  have  been  the  Indian  Factories  Act 


1  The  Industrial  Disputes  Committee  appointed  by  the  Government  of  Bombay 
expresses  the  “sincere  hope  that  there  will  be,  neither  on  the  part  of  the  State  nor  of 
industry,  any  hostility  to  the  free  evolution  of  the  Trade  Union  Movement  . 

The  outside  friend  of  labor,  if  he  is  a  genuine  friend  of  labor  and  is  not  using  his  influ¬ 
ence  for  other  purposes,  is  in  present  conditions  a  necessity  ...  As  soon  as 
a  genuine  Trade  Union  organization  emerges  it  should  be  officially  recognized  as 
the  channel  of  communication  between  employers  and  employed.”  They  further 
recommend  Works’  Committees,  welfare  work  which  they  regard  as  “efficiency  work,” 
medical  attendance,  maternity  benefits,  creches  for  children  of  working  mothers,  work¬ 
ers’  education,  cloth  shops  for  employees,  tea  shops  and  restaurants  for  the  sale  of 
cooked  food  at  cost,  better  housing,  the  removal  of  liquor  and  bucket  shops,  and,  when 
all  other  agencies  fail,  an  Industrial  Court  of  Inquiry  to  be  followed  by  an  Industrial 
Court  of  Conciliation,  half  representing  the  employers  and  half  the  operatives,  with 
a  neutral  chairman.  Altogether  their  report  is  most  wise,  just  and  statesmanlike. 
Bombay  Labor  Gazette,  April,  1922,  p.  23-31, 


76 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


which  was  followed  by  the  Mines  Act  and  the  Workmen’s 
Compensation  Act.1 

India  has  increased  her  trade  about  ten-fold  in  half  a 
century,  built  37,700  miles  of  railway,  and  improved 
27,000,000  acres  of  land  by  the  most  colossal  system  of 
irrigation  in  the  world. 

The  present  political  situation  affects  industrial  condi¬ 
tions.  India  today  is  swept  by  a  vast  revolution  of 
thought  affecting  one-fifth  of  the  human  race.  The  320 
millions  of  India  are  divided  between  some  four  thousand 
different  castes.  Yet  in  spite  of  being  the  most  divided 
country  in  the  world,  the  leaders  of  India  after  the  war 
were  forged  and  fused  into  one  burning  unit  of  new  national 
aspiration.  Under  the  leadership  of  Mr.  Gandhi  they  de¬ 
manded  “swaraj,”  or  complete  self-determination,  the  ma¬ 
jority  preferring  home  rule  within  the  Empire.  They  pro¬ 
posed  to  attain  this  not  by  violence  or  military  force  but 
by  moral  suasion  or  “soul-force,”  by  non-violent,  non¬ 
cooperation  with  the  government.  They  demand  economic 
self-determination  under  their  own  self-government. 

India,  like  China,  has  large  undeveloped  resources.  Her 
output  of  coal  has  doubled  since  1910  with  an  annual  pro¬ 
duction  of  over  22,500,000  tons,  or  a  little  greater  than  that 

i  The  Indian  Factories  (Amendment)  Act,  1922,  provides  for  a  maximum  11-hour 
working  day  and  a  60-hour  week,  which  was  allowed  to  India  by  the  Washington 
Labor  Conference,  as  against  48  hours  for  Europe,  or  an  average  of  six  days  of  10  hours 
each;  for  one  rest  day  in  seven;  for  fixed  hours  of  employment  and  periods  of  rest. 
Work  is  forbidden  for  children  under  12,  those  from  12  to  15  may  work  half  time,  not 
exceeding  6  hours  a  day.  There  is  no  night  work  for  women.  We  only  wish  that  every 
state  in  America  had  such  a  law. 

The  Indian  Mines  Act  of  1924  provides^  for  one  day’s  rest  in  seven,  work  above 
ground  limited  to  60  hours  a  week,  below  ground  to  54  hours,  no  children  under  13 
to  be  employed  either  below  or  above  ground;  with  provisions  for  inspectors,  health 
and  safety  of  workers,  etc.  The  Workmen’s  Compensation  Act  provides  for  com¬ 
pensation  for  injury  and  death  to  cover  over  3,000,000  workers  in  factories,  mines, 
railways,  ships,  etc.  This  is  most  important  as  in  Bombay  alone  diming  the  last  decade 
12,000  workers  were  incapacitated  permanently  or  temporarily  by  accidents;  in  many 
cases  without  any  compensation  from  their  employers. 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION 


77 


of  China  and  nearly  equal  to  Japan.1  She  has  large  de¬ 
posits  of  iron  ore  which  are  among  the  best  in  the  world. 
India  is  the  fourth  country  in  the  world  in  her  railway 
mileage,  exceeding  that  of  France  or  Great  Britain.  Her 
cotton  industry  exceeds  that  of  Italy,  Belgium  or  Japan. 
She  has  a  monopoly  of  jute  which  supplies  the  world  with 
sacking  and  packing  materials.  India  stands  first  in  the 
world  in  her  production  of  rice,  sugar,  tea  and  jute;  second 
in  production  of  wheat  and  cotton,  with  a  large  production 
of  manganese,  oil,  etc. 

Why  is  it  then,  though  India  has  large  natural  resources 
and  next  to  China  the  largest  supply  of  cheap  labor  in  the 
world,  that  she  is  very  backward  in  her  industrial  develop¬ 
ment?  India’s  stores  of  money  have  lain  idle  and  Indian 
capital  has  been  shy  of  industrial  investment.  Her  labor 
has  been  inefficient  though  capable  of  great  improvement. 
She  has  been  dependent  on  foreign  leadership  in  commerce 
and  industry  and  her  own  intelligentsia  had  no  taste  for 
industrialism. 

Nine-tenths  of  India’s  teeming  population  is  in  her 
737,000  villages.  Each  is  a  small  isolated  self-sufficient 
community  surrounded  by  farm  land  owned  individually 
or  collectively.  The  land  is  sub-divided  in  minute  frag¬ 
mentation  like  a  checker  board.  The  size  of  an  average 
farm  is  from  one  to  five  acres,  though  sometimes  an  acre 
is  cut  up  into  more  than  a  score  of  small  holdings.  About 
72  per  cent  of  the  population  is  engaged  in  agriculture  or 
pasture.2 3 


1  The  coal  production  of  the  world  in  millions  of  tons  is  approximately  1,500,  of 

whioh  the  United  States  produce  550  to  650,  Great  Britain  300,  France  50,  Belgium 
25,  Japan  30,  India  22,  China  20,  Canada  15,  etc.  World  Almanac,  1923,  p.  758. 

3  By  the  Census  of  1921,  India  has  more  than  220  millions  engaged  in  Agriculture 
and  220  million  acres  of  land  under  cultivation,  or  one  acre  per  person.  The  Co¬ 
operative  Movement  is  one  of  the  chief  factors  of  progress  in  India.  Beginning  in  1904, 
it  has  increased  rapidly  in  recent  years  until  in  1921  there  were  47,000  societies  with 
1,750,000  members  and  active  adherents,  with  a  collective  capital  of  about  $417,000. 


78 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


Following  Japan’s  victory  over  Russia  in  1906  the 
Swadeshi  Movement,  supported  by  the  educated  classes 
for  the  patriotic  patronage  of  home  production,  was  the 
first  sign  of  the  industrial  awakening  of  the  Indian  people. 
It  was  the  war,  however,  that  did  most  to  revolutionize 
industry.  It  showed  clearly  the  danger  of  India’s  reliance 
on  imports  from  overseas  and  forced  the  Government  to 
take  vigorous  measures  to  make  the  country  more  self- 
contained,  both  economically  and  for  purposes  of  defence. 
The  appointment  of  the  Industrial  Commission,  1916-1918, 
marked  a  change  in  public  opinion. 

During  the  past  few  years  the  industrial  development  of 
the  country  has  made  rapid  progress.  Amongst  the  nu¬ 
merous  activities  of  the  Central  and  Provincial  Depart¬ 
ments  of  Industries,  might  be  mentioned  the  opening  of  a 
number  of  trades  schools  and  training  centres,  and  the 
financing  of  numerous  pioneer  industries  such  as  the  manu¬ 
facture  of  glassware,  rubber  goods,  soap,  ink,  aluminum, 
pencils,  condensed  piilk,  matches,  etc.  In  other  directions 
Indian  industry  has  made  rapid  strides.  The  high  pro¬ 
tective  duties  of  the  past  few  years  have  considerably  in¬ 
creased  the  demand  for  Indian  and  woolen  goods,  steel  and 
iron  ware,  but  high  tariffs  will  make  the  rich  richer  and  the 
poor  poorer  in  India. 

With  her  vast  supply  of  cheap  labor,  which  can  be 
obtained  at  from  ten  to  twenty  cents  a  day,  with  her  large 
resources  in  raw  materials  and  the  new  nationalistic  de¬ 
mand  for  the  fostering  of  her  own  industries,  India  will 
take  an  important  place  in  the  industrial  world.  Already 

As  it  brings  together  a  whole  village  in  economic  solidarity  and  is  the  people’s  own 
affair,  it  has  possibilities  for  rural  reorganization  and  adult  education  that  are  of  great 
promise  for  India.  It  has  made  a  spendid  beginning  in  co-operative  credit  and  will 
doubtless  soon  extend  in  productive  and  distributive  developments  as  in  Europe.  See 
Co-operative  Movement,  International  Labor  Review,  February,  1922,  pp.  229-250,  and 
Indian  Co-operative  Studies  by  R.  B.  Eubank. 


INDIA’S  INDUSTRIAL  REVOLUTION 


79 


she  has  been  recognized  by  the  Council  of  the  League  of 
Nations  as  one  of  the  eight  chief  industrial  countries  of 
the  world.1 

Calcutta  is  now  the  center  of  the  jute  industry.  Bengal 
has  over  a  thousand  mills,  employing  more  than  430,000. 
Bombay,  now  one  of  the  great  cotton  centers  of  the  world, 
has  954  mills  with  312,000  operatives.  Madras  has  over 
500  establishments  with  some  100,000  workers.  India’s 
principal  manufactures  are  cotton  and  jute,  followed  by 
wool,  iron  and  steel,  paper,  etc.  During  the  twenty-six 
years  from  1892  to  the  close  of  the  war,  the  number  of 
India’s  factories  had  increased  398  per  cent  and  industrial 
laborers  239  per  cent.  India’s  foreign  trade  has  increased 
over  forty-five  fold  since  1834  and  at  the  close  of  the  war 
reached  over  one  and  a  half  billion  dollars,  being  a  little 
less  than  that  of  Japan  and  more  than  that  of  China. 

The  Tatas  are  a  fine  example  of  Indian  enterprise.  Be¬ 
ginning  about  1850  with  almost  nothing,  they  built  up  their 
large  fortune  out  of  their  cotton  mills  in  Bombay  and 
Nagpur.  The  great  iron  and  steel  works  at  Tatanagar 
reduced  what  was  a  barren  jungle  in  Bengal  in  1908,  to  a 
great  model  industrial  city,  comfortably  housing  some 
forty  thousand  of  their  own  employees  and  fifty  thousand 
others  employed  in  subsidiary  enterprises.  Their  invest- 


i  Lord  Chelmsford,  the  late  Viceroy  of  India,  in  speaking  on  behalf  of  India's  indus¬ 
trial  importance  at  the  Council  of  the  League  of  Nations,  referred  to  India  as  one  of  the 
first  countries  to  convert  the  Resolutions  of  the  Washington  Labor  Conference  into 
statutory  form.  Although  claiming  the  industrial  population  of  India  as  20  millions, 
on  the  basis  of  Professor  Gini’s  figures  for  the  League,  he  compared  the  industrial 
population  of  the  leading  countries  affiliated  with  the  League  having  over  a  million 
workers  among  which  India  ranks  fourth. 


United  Kingdom 

Germany . 

France . 

India . 

Italy . 

Japan  . 


13,000,000 
12,000,000 
S,  000, 000 
8,000,000 
5,500,000 
5,000,000 


80  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

ment  of  millions  with  five  modern  blast  furnaces  now 
claims  to  be  turning  out  the  cheapest  pig  iron  in  the  world. 
Their  vast  hydro-electrical  plants  are  harnessing  the  power 
of  the  rainfall  of  western  India  at  a  cost  of  over  $50,000,000 
to  develop  finally  over  150,000  horse-power  for  Bombay, 
a  city  of  a  million  people.  Their  engineering  works,  cement 
companies,  oil  mills,  sugar  corporation,  industrial  bank  and 
hotel  companies  are  a  further  mark  of  the  enterprise  of 
this  great  Indian  firm.  With  an  eight-hour  day  in  Tata- 
nagar,  shop  committees,  a  relatively  high  wage  scale,  work¬ 
men’s  insurance  and  wise  welfare  work,  they  are  setting  an 
example  to  both  Indian  and  foreign  employers.  They 
suggest  the  possibilities  of  India’s  future  industrial  develop¬ 
ment. 


Chapter  IV 

THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 

As  the  storm  center  of  the  chief  problems  which  now 
confront  the  new  world  of  labor,  the  writer  again  visited 
Russia.  Concerning  no  other  country  has  there  been  such 
a  flood  of  propaganda,  both  red  and  white,  such  exaggera¬ 
tion  and  distortion  of  fact  in  the  interest  of  passion  and 
prejudice.  In  no  other  country  did  we  find  it  so  difficult 
simply  to  see  and  to  tell  the  truth  objectively.  For  in¬ 
stance,  as  we  crossed  the  border  we  saw  the  red  flag  and 
the  soldiers  of  the  red  army.  To  one  traveler  in  our  com¬ 
partment  they  suggested  the  red  of  bloodshed  and  the 
Terror,  to  another  the  great  principle  of  the  blood  of  a 
common  humanity  of  one  brotherhood.  The  determining 
factor  was  the  attitude  of  the  observer.  It  is  so  throughout 
Russia.  Some  can  see  nothing  good,  and  others  nothing 
bad. 

Our  one  desire  has  been  to  keep  an  open  mind  and  to  be 
fair;  to  record  impartially  and  objectively  what  we  saw. 
During  our  visit,  from  Riga  through  Russia  and  back  to 
the  Polish  border,  in  Moscow  or  Petrograd,  we  moved 
everywhere  with  perfect  freedom.  We  went  anywhere 
alone  by  night  or  day,  chose  our  own  interpreters,  selected 
the  factories  we  wished  to  inspect,  saw  everything  we  de¬ 
sired  and  talked  with  everybody  we  wished,  whether  they 
were  friends  or  foes  of  the  present  regime.  Nowhere  have 
we  been  accorded  greater  kindness,  courtesy  and  freedom 
of  movement,  or  met  more  frank,  fearless  and  honest  men 

81 


82  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

than  some  of  the  leaders  we  interviewed.  We  criticized 
freely  the  methods  of  the  present  government  to  their  face 
and  told  them  the  evils  we  observed  in  their  system. 

With  all  its  faults  the  present  government  impressed  us 
as  better  than  the  hideous  regime  of  old  Czarist  Russia 
which  we  found  a  decade  ago.  Instead  of  the  hunger  and 
famine  in  Moscow,  “the  city  of  the  dead,”  of  two  years 
before,  it  is  now  throbbing  with  new  life  and  its  population 
increased  from  one  to  two  millions.  Shops  are  open,  private 
business,  buying  and  selling  in  industry  and  agriculture  are 
in  full  swing;  there  is  an  apparent  trade  boom,  everywhere 
streets  are  being  paved,  houses  repaired  and  painted  and 
life  quickened  by  a  new  hope. 

We  attended  the  great  All-Russian  Agricultural  and 
Home  Industries  Exhibition  where  the  whole  life  of  Russia 
is  focused  and  visualized  from  the  Arctic  to  the  semi¬ 
tropics,  from  the  Esquimaux  of  the  Pacific  to  Turkestan 
and  the  borders  of  India.  We  saw  their  exhibits  of  indus¬ 
try,  agriculture,  peasant  life  and  the  working  of  their  great 
Co-operatives.  We  observed  their  demonstrations  and 
tourist  parties  for  nearly  a  million  peasants  brought  in 
from  all  the  Russias  to  be  instructed  at  the  Exhibit  in  the 
use  of  tractors,  modern  machinery,  demonstrations  in 
methods  of  farming,  the  conduct  of  community  centers, 
social  welfare  and  training  for  citizenship. 

With  all  its  mistakes,  which  are  many,  we  found  an 
actual  government  composed  for  the  most  part  of  working¬ 
men,  administering  with  growing  success  the  most  vast 
state  in  the  world.  And  they  are  in  a  measure  economically 
succeeding  after  facing  for  six  years  probably  the  most 
colossal  combination  of  difficulties  which  ever  confronted 
a  single  people  in  the  same  period  of  time.  They  have  had 
to  overcome  the  inheritance  of  a  corrupt  Czarist  regime,  the 
greatest  loss  of  any  nation  in  the  world  war,  a  world 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 


83 


blockade  and  two  revolutions.  They  have  had  to  meet 
allied  invasion  from  without  and  counter  revolutionary 
white  armies  within,  fighting  at  one  time  on  twelve  fronts. 
They  have  had  to  contend  with  the  strike  and  sabotage  of 
almost  their  whole  bureaucracy  and  united  bourgeois  oppo¬ 
sition.  Finally,  they  have  had  to  pass  in  turn  through 
chaos,  bankruptcy  and  awful  famine. 

Despite  the  almost  daily  prophecy  of  their  speedy  down¬ 
fall,  and  their  widespread  unpopularity,  they  have  emerged 
from  all  this  not  only  more  firmly  entrenched  than  ever, 
but  apparently  the  most  enduring  cabinet  or  party  in 
Europe  today.  The  Conservative  Baldwin  Government  in 
Britain,  and  that  of  Poincare  in  France,  Stresemann  in 
Germany  and  Mussolini  in  Italy  give  promise  of  falling 
long  before  that  in  Russia.  Lenine  has  broken  down,  but 
he  is  hardly  missed,  for  the  Government  of  Russia  is  not 
and  never  has  been  a  one-man  regime.  We  refer  in  this 
connection  to  the  government  as  enduring,  in  the  British 
sense  of  the  cabinet  or  party  in  power,  not  to  the  social 
order.  Nearly  all  responsible  leaders  in  Russia  agree  that 
the  people  are  utterly  sick  of  further  war,  or  revolution,  or 
foreign  intervention  which  proved  such  a  miserable  failure 
and  that  there  is  no  other  party  in  sight  that  could  preserve 
law  and  order  in  Russia. 

Now  let  us  face  the  facts.  Here  is  a  movement  of  vast 
possible  significance  for  good  or  evil,  which  must  be  studied 
and  interpreted  if  we  are  to  understand  the  present  inter¬ 
national  situation  or  the  new  world  of  labor. 

As  we  left  the  country  we  endeavored  to  focus  our 
thought  and  sum  up  our  conflicting  impressions  of  Russia. 
They  cannot  be  reduced  to  a  single  formula.  Rather  we 
were  forced  to  note  the  contrasts  between  things  good  and 
evil.  Among  the  glaring  evils  of  the  present  system  are 
the  following:  v 


84 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


1.  There  is  a  frankly  avowed  atheism,  materialism  and 
anti-religious  policy  of  the  individual  members  of  the  Com¬ 
munist  Party,  despite  the  measure  of  liberty  of  conscience 
and  religious  toleration  which  the  government  officially  has 
allowed  to  the  Church. 

We  appreciate  the  deep,  mystical  religious  consciousness 
of  the  Russian  people,  their  unique  capacity  for  suffering 
and  sacrifice,  and  the  sublime  elements  of  worth  in  the 
Orthodox  Church  once  it  is  reformed.  But  when  it  is 
remembered  how  some  of  Russia’s  present  leaders  suffered 
at  the  hands  of  the  Church  as  well  as  of  the  State,  and 
what  a  caricature  of  religion  was  presented  to  them  in  the 
superstition,  hypocrisy  and  corruption  typified  by  such  men 
as  Rasputin,  their  rejection  of  the  religion  which  they  knew 
is  not  so  much  to  be  wondered  at  as  their  measure  of  tolera¬ 
tion.  They  have,  however,  been  merciless  to  those  whom 
they  believed  were  guilty  of  counter-revolutionary  plotting 
and  meddling  in  politics. 

2.  There  is  the  Orthodox  Marxian  policy  of  the  class  war 
and  the  dictatorship  of  the  proletariat.  They  believe  that 
other  countries  have  a  veiled  dictatorship  of  the  privileged 
one-tenth,  while  they  claim  a  frank  dictatorship  on  behalf 
of  the  hitherto  unprivileged  nine-tenths  who  constitute  the 
working  masses.  They  claim  that  this  dictatorship  is  tem¬ 
porary,  and  that  once  it  has  been  fully  established  by  a 
minority  on  behalf  of  the  majority,  it  will  automatically 
terminate  all  class  distinctions,  abolish  itself  and  take  in 
the  whole  united  communal  society.  But  the  love  of  power 
may  prove  an  evil  and  a  tyranny  as  great  as  the  love  of 
money  which  they  decry.  There  is,  however,  some  evidence 
and  promise  of  a  lessening  of  this  dictatorship. 

3.  There  is  a  fundamental  denial  of  liberty  to  all  who 
oppose  the  government,  similar  to  that  of  the  old  regime. 
Russia  has  always  had  a  strong,  stern,  centralized,  auto- 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 


85 


cratic  government.  As  we  compare  Russia  under  the  Bol¬ 
sheviks  and  under  the  Czar  as  we  saw  it  a  decade  ago,  the 
present  government  appears  to  be  far  better  than  that  of 
the  old  system.  But  there  is  little  room  for  the  expression 
of  public  opinion,  no  freedom  of  the  press,  and  no  liberty 
for  voting  or  acting  on  economic,  social  or  religious  issues 
in  opposition  to  the  policy  of  the  present  government.  For 
the  present  at  least  they  frankly  profess  dictatorship  rather 
than  democracy.  The  priceless  possession  of  the  human 
spirit  of  liberty,  after  a  thousand  years  of  struggle,  has  been 
abandoned,  at  least  for  the  time  being. 

4.  There  is  a  continued  bureaucracy,  compulsion  and 
state  control  of  life ,  often  similar  to  that  of  the  old  regime, 
that  does  not  allow  the  same  free  play  for  independence 
and  individual  initiative  found  in  other  countries. 

5.  There  is  an  evident  lowering  of  standards  in  higher 
education,  especially  in  the  universities.  Russia  has  a 
remarkable  plan  for  primary,  practical  and  technical  edu¬ 
cation,  though  they  lack  means  as  yet  adequately  to  carry 
it  out.  But  there  has  been  a  frank  suppression  of  idealistic  . 
teaching  in  philosophy,  theology  and  cultural  studies;  a 
suppression  of  academic  freedom,  and  a  dilution  of  the 
universities  in  the  interest  of  practical,  utilitarian  education 
for  the  working  classes,  at  the  expense  of  the  former  cul¬ 
tural  education  for  the  few.  There  is  a  whole  Russian 
university  in  Berlin  composed  largely  of  professors  and 
students  who  were  banished  for  their  idealism  or  who  fled 
from  the  Terror. 

6.  There  is  a  lowering  of  moral  and  spiritual  standards 
in  some  areas  of  life,  chiefly  as  the  result  of  the  inherited 
corruption  of  the  Czarist  regime,  the  pressure  of  poverty, 
and  a  materialistic  and  atheistic  interpretation  of  life.  As 
a  result  of  this  situation,  liberty,  religion  and  idealism  will 


86 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


have  to  fight  for  their  very  life  in  Russia  during  this 
generation  as  in  no  other  country  in  the  world. 

There  is  a  remarkable  discipline  in  the  Communist  Party 
which  is  today  guiding  the  destinies  of  the  132,000,000 
people  of  Russia.  Of  the  body  politic,  the  directing  brain 
and  nervous  system  may  be  compared  to  the  Communist 
Party  of  450,000;  the  body  and  hands  are  the  workers  in 
organized  trade  unions  which  they  claim  number  nearly 
5,000,000;  the  ponderous  limbs  are  the  more  than  110,000,- 
000  peasants  who  constitute  85  per  cent  of  the  population. 
The  rest  are  considered  vestigial  survivals  like  the  appendix 
which  once  had  a  functional  use. 

The  government  is  making  a  tremendous  fight  against 
graft  and  bribery,  under  the  inherited  traditions  of  the 
old  regime  of  abysmal  corruption.  Conditions  are,  how¬ 
ever,  still  very  bad.  Nevertheless,  despite  these  failings 
Russia  constitutes  an  economic  and  industrial  challenge, 
wherever  ruthless  capitalism  exists  in  the  world.  In  refer¬ 
ring  to  “ruthless  capitalism”  we  fully  recognize  the  legiti¬ 
mate  and  necessary  accumulation  of  capital  without  which 
modern  industry  cannot  be  conducted.  Throughout  this 
book  what  we  mean  by  ruthless  capitalism  is  the  exces¬ 
sive  concentration  of  power  and  privilege  as  a  result  of 
vast  wealth  in  the  hands  of  a  few;  monopoly  of  natural 
resources  for  private  gain  at  the  expense  of  public  welfare; 
autocratic  control  of  industry;  production  for  individual 
profit  and  power  rather  than  for  social  use  and  service, 
with  consequent  extravagant  luxury  for  some  while  many 
live  in  poverty  and  want.  We  do  not  believe  that  State 
Capitalism,  State  Socialism  or  Military  Communism  fur¬ 
nish  any  panacea  for  the  evils  of  our  present  system. 
While  we  wish  to  be  fair  and  to  do  justice  to  any  elements 
of  truth  in  this  and  every  other  system,  we  do  not  believe 
in  the  Bolshevik  theory  of  life  for  the  reasons  already 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA  87 

stated — its  anti-religious  policy,  its  class  war  and  dic¬ 
tatorship,  its  fundamental  denial  of  liberty,  the  state  con¬ 
trol  of  life,  the  lowering  of  standards  in  higher  education 
and  the  lowering  of  moral  and  spiritual  ideals. 

The  fundamental  instincts  of  human  nature,  hunger 
and  love,  both  in  the  material  and  spiritual  realm,  cannot 
be  crushed  and  conquered  either  by  capitalism  or  Com¬ 
munism.  Both  systems  in  their  worst  applications  have 
outraged  the  free  spirit  of  man.  But  man  survived  the 
enthroning  of  a  painted  Goddess  of  Reason  in  the  endur¬ 
ing  cathedral  of  Notre  Dame,  the  red  terror  of  the  Guil¬ 
lotine,  and  the  militarism  and  sordid  vanity  of  the  coarse 
Corsican  butcher  who  made  a  caricature  of  the  French 
Revolution.  France  still  bears  the  scars  of  the  evils  of 
that  period.  Yet  the  great  ideals  of  liberty,  equality  and 
fraternity  lived  on  in  a  freer  Europe  despite  the  wild 
license  and  debasing  mixture  of  good  and  evil  in  the  move¬ 
ment.  We  do  not  condone  the  evils  of  either  the  French 
or  Russian  revolutions,  but  we  should  appreciate  the  full 
significance  of  each.  We  shall  reserve  final  criticism  of 
the  Bolshevik  regime  until  the  closing  chapter,  endeavoring 
in  this  only  to  state  the  facts  in  the  case  impartially  and 
to  describe  industrial  conditions  as  we  found  them. 

The  significance  of  Russia  is  enhanced  by  its  very  mass 
and  magnitude.  Midway  between  East  and  West,  the  Rus¬ 
sian  Empire  at  the  opening  of  the  war  contained  more  than 
one-seventh  of  the  land  surface  of  the  globe  and  about  one- 
ninth  of  its  population.1  Stretching  for  over  six  thousand 
miles  across  Asia  and  Europe,  it  was  approximately  twice 
the  size  of  all  the  rest  of  Europe.  Siberia  alone  with  its 

1915  1923 

Area  in  Square  Miles .  8,417,118  8,166,130 

Population  (estimated) .  182,182,600  131,546,045 

Statesman’s  Year  Book,  1923,  p.  1278.  Losses  were  in  Poland,  Esthonia, 
Lithuania,  Latvia,  Finland,  etc. 


88  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

vast  resources  has  an  area  one  and  a  half  times  that  of 
the  United  States,  and  if  peopled  with  the  same  density  of 
population  as  Belgium,  would  hold  almost  twice  the  present 
population  of  the  world.  When  a  state  with  such  resources 
and  with  the  largest  white  population  in  the  world  tries 
the  boldest  social  experiment  in  all  history,  it  must  be 
reckoned  with.  At  least  we  shall  not  solve  the  problem  by 
telling  lies  about  the  present  government  such  as  the 
ridiculous  statement  that  all  women  had  been  nationalized, 
or  other  baseless  propaganda,  furnished  by  members  of  the 
old  order  dispossessed  of  their  privileges  under  the  Czar, 
or  other  interested  parties,  determined  that  a  workingman’s 
government  should  not  succeed. 

Further,  the  significance  of  the  present  movement  in 
Russia  can  only  be  adequately  understood  in  the  light  of 
its  past  history.  Russia  has  been  marked  for  suffering  for 
a  thousand  years.  It  has  been  the  land  of  autocracy  and 
revolution.  Between  the  eighth  and  thirteenth  centuries 
the  land  was  laid  waste  by  eighty-three  civil  wars.  For 
the  next  two  centuries  (1238-1467  A.  D.)  it  was  swept  by 
invasion  under  the  galling  Tartar  or  Mongol  domination; 
it  was  rent  by  ninety  internal  conflicts  and  more  than  a 
hundred  and  fifty  foreign  wars. 

Then  for  five  centuries  Russia  suffered  under  the  autoc¬ 
racy  of  the  Czars.  Ivan  the  Terrible  began  a  reign  of 
terror  which  lasted  for  twenty-five  years.  Before  the  last 
feeble  Czar,  Nicholas  II,  came  to  the  throne  in  1894,  for 
two  decades  an  average  of  some  twenty  thousand  victims  a 
year  had  been  sent  to  Siberia.  The  government  of  the  last 
Czar  had  banished  180,000  political  exiles. 

We  stood  in  Petrograd  in  the  dark  fortress  of  Peter  and 
Paul  between  the  tombs  of  the  dead  Czars  on  the  one 
hand,  and  the  cells  of  their  former  political  prisoners  on 
the  other.  For  centuries  the  finest  spirits  in  Russia  had 


89 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 

cherished  their  dream  of  a  new  sc'/ml  order.  They  had 
lived  for  it,  suffered  for  it  in  dungeon  and  exile,  thousands 
had  died  for  it.  They  had  dreamed  of  a  country  that 
should  be  free  of  police  and  spies,  free  from  the  caricature 
of  religion  in  a  State  Church  that  had  become  almost  an 
adjunct  of  the  police  department  and  of  the  spy  system, 
free  from  the  exploiter  and  profiteer,  from  all  autocracy, 
aristocracy  and  plutocracy.  They  had  dreamed  of  world 
brotherhood,  of  communal  well-being  in  mutual  service 
without  the  motive  of  private  profit  and  selfish  hoarding. 

We  stood  in  the  Revolutionary  Museum  in  the  Czar's 
Winter  Palace  in  Petrograd,  where  one  sees  the  portrayal 
of  the  long  century  of  struggle  for  freedom,  from  the  revo¬ 
lution  of  1825  to  the  present.  A  blind  bureaucracy  had 
opposed  all  reformers,  suppressed  the  conquered  national¬ 
ities,  dissolved  or  treated  with  contempt  the  Duma  and 
legislative  assemblies,  outlawed  trade  unions  and  had  put- 
down  peasant  revolts  and  industrial  strikes  with  bloodshed. 
The  spy  system  and  secret  police  both  in  state  and  church 
developed  into  “a  vast  secret  society  which  permeated  and 
poisoned  the  whole  of  Russian  social  life.”  This  was  the 
stern  school  of  autocracy  and  oppression  in  which  the 
present  rules  of  Russia  studied.  And  this  must  be  remem¬ 
bered  in  judging  the  present  government.  Most  of  the 
evils  of  the  present  system  were  found  in  the  old  Czarist 
regime  which  our  government  recognized. 

In  the  World  War  Russia  suffered  more  than  any  other 
great  nation.  Of  some  15,000,000  called  to  the  colors 
1,700,000  fell  among  the  battle  dead,  and  a  total  of  over 
3,000,000  died  of  wounds,  disease,  neglect  and  starvation. 
Betrayed  by  their  corrupt  leaders,  left  often  without  muni¬ 
tions  and  supplies  to  fight  with  sticks  and  stones,  the 
morale  of  the  troops  at  the  front  was  finally  broken,  and 
the  hungry  mobs  in  Petrograd  rose  in  bread  riots,  only  to 


90 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


be  shot  down  by  the  soldiers.  In  all  the  terrible  events 
that  followed  in  the  downfall  of  Russia  the  malign  influence 
of  Germany  must  be  fully  recognized. 

It  is  said  that  every  country  gets  the  kind  of  revolution 
it  deserves.  On  March  12,  1917,  the  first  revolution  broke 
out  in  Russia,  beginning  with  a  strike  of  the  industrial 
workers  threatened  with  starvation.  Regiments  sent  to 
crush  the  revolt  joined  the  strikers;  and  the  Czar,  Nicholas 
II,  finally  abdicated.  A  provisional  government  under 
Prince  Lvoff  was  followed  by  a  new  cabinet  under  Keren¬ 
sky,  but  neither  satisfied  the  demands  of  the  people. 
Liberty  had  given  place  to  license,  discipline  was  at  an 
end,  chaos  reigned.  The  peasants  wanted  land,  the  indus¬ 
trial  workers  demanded  control  of  the  factories,  there  were 
constant  demonstrations  and  threatened  uprisings,  while 
the  central  government  was  weak  and  nerveless.  Russia 
was  on  the  verge  of  breaking  up  into  rival  revolutionary 
states  in  endless  civil  war.  One  party  alone  now  emerged 
that  knew  just  what  it  wanted  and  had  the  power  to 
enforce  its  demands.1 

During  the  war,  councils  or  soviets  of  workers  were 
formed  in  the  factories,  of  peasants  in  the  country,  and 
soldiers  in  the  army.  As  the  peasants  had  not  been  given 
the  land  nor  the  town  workers  bread,  a  popular  revolt 
began.  This  second  Russian  Workers’  Revolution  took 
place  on  November  7,  1917.  As  soon  as  the  Petrograd 
Soviet  obtained  a  Bolshevik  majority  they  seized  the  Gov¬ 
ernment  and  handed  it  over  to  the  All-Russia  Congress 

1  There  had  been  three  revolutionary  groups  in  Russia,  the  Communist  followers 
of  Marx,  the  Anarchist  followers  of  Bakunin  and  Prince  Kropotkin,  and  the  Social¬ 
ist  Revolutionaries,  one  wing  of  which  pursued  the  policy  of  terrorism.  The  first 
group  organized  the  Marxian  Social  Democratic  Labor  Party  in  1898  among  the  town 
workers.  In  the  division  which  arose  in  the  party  the  Mensheviki  favored  co-opera¬ 
tion  with  the  bourgeois  Liberals,  while  the  Bolsheviki  under  Lenine  favored  the  dic¬ 
tatorship  of  the  proletarian  workers  on  their  own  account. 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 


91 


of  Soviets.  The  Czarist  Empire  had  now  become  the 
“Russian  Socialist  Federal  Soviet  Republic.”1 

The  Bolshevik  Government  withdrew  from  what  they 
regarded  as  an  imperialist  war  and  signed  the  separate  and 
humiliating  peace  of  Brest-Litovsk.  They  then  endeav¬ 
ored  to  make  the  colossal  transition  from  a  capitalist  to  a 
socialist  order.  Two  series  of  decrees  were  now  issued,  one 
aiming  at  the  destruction  of  the  old  order,  and  the  other 
at  the  establishment  of  the  new  through  the  improvement 
of  the  social  conditions  of  the  people.  A  Declaration  of 
Rights  was  passed  at  the  Third  All-Russia  Soviet  Con¬ 
gress  and  a  Constitution  was  adopted  at  the  fifth  Congress. 
Russia  became  a  Republic  of  Soviets  of  Workers,  Soldiers 
and  Peasants.  Private  property  in  land  was  abolished, 
all  land  becoming,  in  theory  at  least,  the  common  property 
of  the  people.  The  State  declared  its  ownership  of  all 
forests,  mines,  national  resources,  factories,  railways  and 
other  means  of  production  and  transport. 

The  Republic  became  a  free  Socialist  community  of  all 
laboring  classes.  Freedom  of  conscience,  of  opinion,  of 
the  press  and  of  meeting  were  guaranteed.  The  franchise 
was  granted  irrespective  of  religion,  nationality  or  sex  to 
all  citizens  over  eighteen  engaged  in  productive  labor;  it 
was  denied  to  all  who  exploited  the  labor  of  others  for 
profit,  or  lived  on  unearned  income,  also  to  monks,  priests, 
members  of  the  former  police  and  criminals.  It  cannot  be 
maintained  that  all  of  the  above  ideals  or  guarantees 
were  carried  into  practice.  Religious  liberty,  for  instance, 
was  hedged  about  with  many  restrictions.  Russia  is  the 
only  country  which  the  writer  has  visited  in  thirty  years 
where  no  Student  Christian  Movement  is  as  yet  permitted. 

1  At  the  Tenth  All-Russian  Congress  of  Soviets,  December  23-27,  1922,  it  was  de¬ 
cided  to  unite  all  the  Soviet  Republics  in  a  single  federal  state.  The  present  official 
name  is  the  Union  of  Socialist  Soviet  Republics  or  the  S.  S.  S.  R. 


92 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


Private  property  and  trade  were  now  to  be  replaced  by 
the  free  exchange  of  the  products  of  industry  for  food 
from  the  country.  But  when  industry  ceased  effectively 
to  produce,  the  burden  of  the  support  of  the  population 
fell  upon  the  peasants,  who  had  all  their  surplus  crops 
taken  from  them.  To  eliminate  the  money  power  of  the 
bourgeoisie,  paper  currency  was  deliberately  debased  by  a 
flood  of  paper  money  which  soon  became  worthless  and 
which  the  peasants  were  unwilling  to  receive.  Peasant 
uprisings  began  to  increase  and  the  area  cultivated  was 
reduced  to  half  what  it  had  been  before  the  war. 

The  Bolshevik  Revolution  was  accomplished  with  re¬ 
markably  little  bloodshed  and  employees  and  men  of  all 
classes  were  invited  to  co-operate  with  the  new  govern¬ 
ment.  With  the  beginning  of  the  destruction  of  the  old 
capitalist  regime  and  the  erection  of  a  new  social  order, 
almost  the  entire  bourgeois,  professional  and  technically 
skilled  class  went  on  strike,  adopted  the  method  of  sabot¬ 
age,  and  organized  a  counter  revolutionary  movement  with 
the  aid  of  foreign  powers.  Fighting  now  for  their  very 
existence,  the  government  replied  by  the  Extraordinary 
Commission  and  the  Terror,  the  worst  features  of  which, 
however,  were  abolished  as  soon  as  counter-revolutionary 
activity  ceased.  We  make  no  defence  of  this  terror,  any 
more  than  we  do  of  that  of  the  French  Revolution.  Its 
severity  can  hardly  be  exaggerated. 

For  three  years  private  shops  were  closed  and  there  was 
almost  no  buying  and  selling.  A  period  of  “military  com¬ 
munism”  was  instituted  in  which  the  state  tried  to  organize 
the  whole  life  of  the  people  on  a  communal  basis.  The 
peasants’  entire  surplus  grain  was  taken  by  the  state  for 
the  support  of  the  army,  the  industrial  workers  and  the 
rest  of  the  population. 

Resenting  this  forcible  seizure  of  their  grain,  the  peas- 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 


93 


ants  ceased  to  raise  more  than  they  needed  for  themselves 
and  the  government  was  now  compelled  to  face  a  world 
of  enemies  from  without  and  within  the  country.  For  six 
years  they  were  forced  to  meet  obstacles  and  opposition 
unparalleled  in  history.  They  had  inherited  the  corruption 
of  five  centuries  of  Czardom.  The  country  was  exhausted 
by  the  war  and  impoverished  by  a  world  blockade.  It  was 
crushed  by  Germany  in  the  Brest-Litovsk  Treaty.  It 
suffered  from  invasion,  as  it  had  to  fight  against  the 
Central  Powers,  the  English,  French,  Japanese,  Czecho¬ 
slovaks,  Poles,  Finns,  Greeks,  and  Roumanians.  Even  an 
American  army  invaded  their  territory. 

The  white  armies  of  Denikin,  Kolchak,  Yudenich,  Kras- 
noff,  Semenoff,  Wrangel,  Petlura,  Balakhovitch  and  the 
Cossacks  were  not  only  fighting  but  some  of  them  perpe¬ 
trating  atrocities  upon  the  helpless  inhabitants  equal  to 
anything  in  history.  Under  the  White  Terror  in  Finland 
alone  out  of  a  small  population  of  3,000,000  some  17,000 
are  said  to  have  perished.  In  the  meantime  Russia  was 
devastated  by  red  and  white  terror  alike. 

After  six  years  of  warfare  following  1914,  Russia  col¬ 
lapsed  in  sheer  exhaustion.  She  was  devastated  by  war 
and  revolution,  swept  by  vast  epidemics,  bankrupt  and 
threatened  with  chaos.  Following  all  this  came  the  awful 
famine  of  1921.  The  American  Relief  Administration 
reported  23,895,000  starving  out  of  a  population  of  42,000,- 
000  in  the  famine  area.1  Reliable  witnesses  informed  the 
writer  that  frozen  corpses,  dogs  and  even  children  were 
eaten  by  persons  frenzied  by  hunger.  Some  three  millions 
are  said  to  have  perished  of  starvation  and  a  total  of  not 

1  The  A.  R.  A.  reported  nearly  15,000,000  fed,  12,000  medical  institutions  assisted, 
7,000,000  persons  inoculated  or  vaccinated,  912,121  tons  of  food  imported,  and  a  total 
expenditure  of  some  $75,000,000.  The  work  of  the  A.  R.  A.  was  beyond  all  praise  and 
has  left  an  enduring  gratitude  in  the  hearts  of  the  Russian  people  that  will  have  an 
important  influence  upon  the  future  relations  of  these  two  great'nations. 


94 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


less  than  ten  millions  from  all  causes  of  war,  revolution, 
famine  and  disease. 

In  the  face  of  such  titanic  obstacles  the  policy  of  mili¬ 
tary  communism  broke  down.  Russia  had  attempted  to 
pass  at  a  bound  from  primitive  agriculture  and  a  disorgan¬ 
ized  industrial  system  to  State  Socialism  and  Communism. 
This  was  impossible.  The  new  state  had  destroyed  its 
credit.  With  the  abolition  of  private  wealth  there  was 
almost  nothing  left  to  tax,  for  state  industries  were  running 
at  a  loss.  A  flood  of  paper  money  to  pay  the  government’s 
bills  ruined  the  currency.  The  workers  were  for  a  time 
demoralized  by  the  new  license.  Even  school  children  had 
their  committees  for  running  the  schools,  as  the  soldiers 
tried  to  run  the  army  and  the  workers  the  factories.  But 
all  reserves  were  soon  exhausted,  and  the  state  could  not 
even  provide  adequate  food  rations  to  keep  the  workers 
from  hunger.  The  period  of  destruction  was  at  an  end. 
Now  began  the  more  difficult  task  of  reconstruction. 

The  government  had  failed  and  confessed  it.1  Lenine 
and  his  colleagues  had  the  sagacity  to  see  it  in  time, 
frankly  admit  their  failure,  and  turn  right  about  face, 
in  the  adoption  of  “The  New  Economic  Policy.” 

The  Communist  leaders  received  the  shock  of  a  rude 
awakening  when  there  was  a  peasant  uprising  in  the 
province  of  Tambov,  and  the  fortress  of  Cronstadt  re- 

1  See  Izvestia,  August  11,  1921.  Lenine  frankly  said:  “We  can  only  continue  to 
exist  by  making  an  appeal  to  the  peasants  .  .  .  The  role  of  the  proletariat  in  such  a 
situation  is  to  supervise  and  guide  these  small  farmers  in  their  transition  to  socialized, 
collective,  communal  labor  .  .  .  Ten  years  at  least,  and,  in  view  of  our  present  ruin, 
probably  more  will  be  required  for  this  transition  .  .  .  We  must  decide  which 

of  two  policies  we  shall  choose.  Either  we  forbid  absolutely  every  private  exchange 
of  goods  or  we  take  the  trouble  to  make  it  a  state  capitalism  .  .  .  State  capital¬ 

ism  is  a  step  forward  toward  the  destruction  of  the  small  bourgeois  attitude  . 

The  kernel  of  the  situation  is  that  one  must  find  a  means  of  directing  the  evolution  of 
capitalism  in  the  bed  of  state  capitalism  so  as  to  insure  the  transition  of  state  capitalism 
into  Socialism.” 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 


95 


volted.  Production  in  industry  had  fallen  to  a  desperate 
fraction  of  the  pre-war  basis  and  of  the  national  needs.1 

The  new  economic  policy  embraced:  1.  The  substitution 
for  the  requisition  of  all  the  peasants’  surplus  grain  by  a 
definite  food  tax,  taking  a  maximum  of  20  per  cent  of  his 
crop.  2.  Freedom  of  trade  within  Russia.  3.  The  dena¬ 
tionalization  of  small  business,  the  revival  of  private  small 
capitalist  production,  and  of  banks  and  shops  on  a  profit¬ 
making  basis.  Also  the  leasing  of  the  majority  of  state- 
controlled  enterprises.  4.  The  concentration  of  state 
control  to  the  more  important  nationalized  industries,  and 
their  combination  in  autonomous  state  “trusts”  under  the 
Supreme  Economic  Council.  5.  The  institution  of  a  State 
Bank  and  the  encouragement  of  the  Co-operative  Societies 
which  had  been  temporarily  absorbed  by  the  state.2 

It  is  only  fair  to  say  that  the  “new”  economic  policy 
was  in  fact  a  frank  retreat,  and  in  part  a  return  to  the 
old  methods  of  capitalism  which  had  been  so  condemned. 
The  government  has  not,  however,  abandoned  its  ideal  and 
aim.  The  present  policy  is  only  a  temporary  concession. 
Their  plan  is  State  Capitalism  now,  State  Socialism  as 

1  Larin,  the  Communist  economist,  contrasted  the  production  of  1920  with  1914  as 
follows:  The  production  of  coal  had  declined  75  per  cent,  petroleum  67,  gold  88,  cast 
iron  97.6,  iron  and  steel  96,  cotton  and  wool  80,  rubber  98  and  chemicals  89.6  per  cent. 

2  See  Statesman’s  Year  Book  1923,  p.  1286.  The  sweeping  changes  in  the  policy 
and  laws  of  Soviet  Russia  are  shown  by  the  following:  November  14,  1917,  Decree 
giving  Workers’  Committees  complete  control  of  all  industries;  May,  1921,  Law  re¬ 
pealed,  individual  management  restored;  November  24,  1917,  Decree  abolishing  all 
existing  courts  and  legal  institutions,  Extraordinary  Commission  or  Cheka  established; 
January,  1922,  New  system  of  courts  established,  Cheka  abolished;  December  14,  1917, 
all  banks  closed,  nationalized  and  assets  confiscated;  December,  1921,  new  bank  law 
passed  and  State  Bank  with  branches  established;  August  20,  1918,  nationalization 
of  land,  prohibiting  private  ownership  of  real  estate;  June  1,  1922,  Decree  passed 
giving  perpetual  right  to  possession  and  right  to  inherit  same;  June  29,  1918,  all 
industries  nationalized;  June,  1922,  many  of  smaller  industries  surrendered.  Owners 
given  preference  in  leasing  others  on  long-time  leases,  50  to  100  years,  etc. 

Ex-Governor  Goodrich,  of  Indiana,  “The  Evolution  of  Soviet  Russia,”  p.  223. 


96 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


soon  as  possible,  and  ultimately  pure  Communism  that  will 
obviate  state  control. 

History  proves,  however,  that  once  this  ground  is  sur¬ 
rendered  it  will  be  difficult  to  recover.  In  Rome  under  the 
Republic  and  the  Empire  no  citizen  ever  held  title  to  his 
land  as  a  personal  possession.  Under  English  law  all  the 
land  theoretically  belongs  to  the  crown,  but  this  is  now 
a  mere  fiction  and  it  would  be  fatal  to  try  and  reclaim 
it.  When  the  peasants  of  Russia  have  long  possessed  the 
land,  when  private  industry  has  been  re-established,  when 
leases  have  been  made  to  private  capitalists  and  conces¬ 
sions  granted  to  foreign  governments  for  recognition,  when 
Russia  comes  again  into  the  family  of  nations  with  the 
constant  influence  and  pressure  of  the  rest  of  the  world 
upon  her,  it  will  be  difficult  if  not  impossible  for  one  nation 
to  live  under  an  economy  of  pure  communism  if  all  the  rest 
of  the  world  is  upon  a  basis  of  unrestricted  capitalism. 

In  the  meantime,  the  Soviet  Government  maintains  an 
almost  absolute  political  and  economic  control.  It  retains 
the  monopoly  of  foreign  trade,  the  control  of  heavy  indus¬ 
try,  the  railways,  the  banking  system  and  of  most  prop¬ 
erty.  A  new  capitalist  class  is  again  springing  up  under 
the  present  system  of  private  trading. 

In  spite  of  all  its  concessions,  the  new  economic  policy, 
while  it  has  succeeded  superficially  in  stimulating  trade 
upon  the  surface,  has  not  as  yet  restored  production  to  its 
pre-war  level  nor  attracted  a  large  amount  of  capital, 
either  foreign  or  domestic.  Within  Russia  there  is  not 
much  private  capital  left  to  attract.  Its  pre-war  estimated 
wealth  of  only  $40,000,000,000  has  been  reduced  to  little 
more  than  half.  Russia’s  greatest  economic  needs  at  the 
moment  are  capital,  credit  and  confidence,  but  she  is  slowly 
gaining  ground  in  all  three. 

The  average  wage  for  an  unskilled  worker  in  1916  was 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 


97 


$141.00  a  year,  or  $11.75  a  month;  it  was  only  $77.50  a 
year,  or  $6.41  a  month,  in  1923,  in  spite  of  the  high  cost 
of  living.1 

Trotsky  in  his  report  to  the  Twelfth  Congress  of  the 
Communist  Party  in  1923  stated  that  the  total  income 
from  industry  and  agriculture  in  1922  was  only  60  per 
cent  of  what  it  was  in  1913.  While  the  agricultural  income 
was  approximately  two-thirds  of  the  pre-war  standard, 
that  from  industry  had  fallen  from  $2,200,000,000  in  1913 
to  $650,000,000  in  1922,  or  less  than  one-third  of  its  pre¬ 
war  value. 

The  gold  value  of  the  money  in  circulation  is  approxi¬ 
mately  only  one-tenth  what  it  was  before  the  war.  Russia’s 
chief  resources  lie  in  grain,  timber,  coal,  iron,  oil,  gold, 
platinum,  manganese,  flax  and  cotton.2  In  all  of  these, 
production  has  fallen  off  greatly.  Compared  to  the  pre¬ 
war  standard  of  1913,  Russia’s  production  in  1922,  accord¬ 
ing  to  the  most  reliable  statistics  obtainable,  was  as 
follows:  Oil  49  per  cent,  salt  36,  coal  34,  electro-technical 
supplies  26,  wool  27,  chemicals  21,  matches  20,  paper  17, 
sugar  12,  glass  9,  platinum  15,  gold  7,  brass  3.5,  steel  7.4, 
pig  iron  3.9,  iron  ore  2.2,  plows  and  reapers  6,  railway 
carriages  only  4  per  cent  of  pre-war  production. 

The  writer  spent  most  of  his  time  in  Russia  investigating 
labor  conditions,  visiting  factories,  interviewing  officials, 
trade  union  leaders  and  representatives  of  the  public  con¬ 
cerning  industrial  problems.  It  must  be  remembered  that 
Russia  is  still  a  primitive  agricultural  country,  more  than 
a  century  behind  Western  Europe  in  its  cultural  standards, 

1  Stroumiline  in  the  official  Moscow  Trade  and  Industrial  Journal. 

2  Before  the  war  Russia  stood  sixth  among  the  nations  of  the  world  in  the  produc¬ 
tion  of  coal,  second  in  petroleum,  fourth  in  iron,  and  provided  nine-tenths  of  the  world’s 
supply  of  platinum.  Russia  took  first  place  in  the  production  of  rye,  second  in  wheat 
and  oats,  and  third  in  the  number  of  cattle,  and  second  in  her  railway  system  of  42,504 
miles.  Russia  is  a  land  of  raw  products  and  vast  potential  wealth. 


98 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


and  that  only  in  recent  decades  had  it  witnessed  the  begin¬ 
ning  of  an  industrial  revolution  and  the  development  of 
its  wealth. 

Apart  from  the  independent  republics,  Russia  claims 
7,785  factories  with  1,744,000  workers,  or  little  more  than 
Japan  or  India.  According  to  official  figures  there  were 
1,180,000  less  industrial  workers  in  1923  than  in  1913. 

In  visiting  Russian  factories  we  selected  first  certain 
nationalized  rubber  works  in  Petrograd  and  Moscow.  The 
total  production  of  each  factory  was  about  one-third  of 
its  pre-war  output.  The  individual  worker,  owing  to  the 
disorganization  of  industry,  produces  from  50  to  60  per 
cent  of  what  he  did  before  the  war.  In  one  factory  the 
workers  had  been  reduced  from  18,000  to  8,000.  Industry 
as  a  whole  has  been  constitutionalized  and  each  factory 
had  its  printed  constitution  or  standard  contract  sent  from 
Moscow,  and  worked  upon  the  basis  of  a  signed  agreement 
between  the  government  “Trust”  of  the  industry  on  the 
one  hand  and  the  workers’  trade  union  on  the  other. 

The  management  and  technical  staff  were  men  of  the 
old  regime  working  loyally  with  the  new  order  and  receiv¬ 
ing  from  $2.00  to  $4.00  a  day.  Labor  showed  a  will  to 
work;  there  was  evidence  of  discipline  and  of  deference 
paid  to  the  management  on  the  part  of  the  workers. 
Labor’s  interference  with  management  and  the  workers’ 
control  of  two  years  before  had  almost  entirely  ceased. 

The  wages  of  the  workers,  which  were  chiefly  on  a  piece¬ 
work  basis,  ran  from  $6.50  to  $45.00  a  month  in  Petrograd, 
and  from  $10.00  to  $50.00  in  Moscow.  Highly  skilled 
workers  received  about  a  dollar  a  day.  The  working  day 
had  been  reduced  from  10  hours  before  the  war  to  8  hours. 
Conditions  for  the  workers  in  the  factories  were  excellent. 

There  was  a  thorough  organization  both  of  workers  and 
management  under  a  government  constitution  with  elabo- 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA 


99 


rate  provision  for  the  settlement  of  disputes  and  conflicts. 
There  was  a  local  trade  union  committee  in  each  factory; 
a  conflict  committee  composed  of  half  workers  and  half 
management;  a  district  council  to  which  appeal  could  be 
made,  and  final  arrangement  for  arbitration.  Most  dis¬ 
agreements  were  settled  before  reaching  the  stage  of  strikes, 
which,  however,  were  not  forbidden  as  a  last  resort. 

Approximately  28  per  cent  of  the  wage  bill  of  each  fac¬ 
tory  was  set  aside  for  social  insurance  for  the  workers. 
There  were  so  many  taxes  and  restrictions  that  at  present 
there  was  no  indication  that  the  factories  were  making  a 
profit  for  the  state.  The  cost  of  the  product  was  about 
double  that  of  pre-war  days,  the  cost  of  living  was  also 
doubled,  the  real  wages  of  the  workers  were  less,  and  the 
profit  of  the  factory  had  disappeared.  Too  many  cooks 
tended  to  spoil  the  broth.  The  moral  standards  of  the 
workers  were  not  high.  Throughout  the  factories  we 
noticed  signs,  “Discharge  for  Theft/’  and  observed  that  we 
ourselves  and  all  workers  were  searched  on  leaving  the 
factory  to  see  if  we  had  any  stolen  goods  upon  us.  In  the 
state  flour  mills  employees  stole  so  much  of  the  flour  that 
profits  vanished  and  some  were  offered  to  their  former 
owners  or  to  private  capitalists.  This  may  be  attributed 
to  long-continued  poverty,  a  period  of  lawlessness,  and  to 
the  confessed  materialism  and  dictatorship  of  the  present 
regime. 

Nevertheless,  in  production,  in  method  and  in  relation¬ 
ships,  conditions  were  steadily  if  slowly  improving  every¬ 
where.  Two  years  ago  nearly  all  writers  like  H.  G.  Wells 
and  Sokoloff  were  speaking  of  industry  as  being  “rapidly 
ruined”  and  of  impending  disaster.  There  is  evidence  now 
of  progressive  adjustment  and  adaptation  and  the  promise 
of  stable  and  permanent  success  in  industry. 

In  textile  factories  we  found  wages  running  from  ap- 


100 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


proximately  $4.00  to  $30.00  a  month,  or  from  seventeen 
cents  to  a  dollar  a  day.  We  met  one  director  receiving 
$1.25  a  day.  The  real  wages  of  the  workers  were  about 
65  per  cent  of  the  pre-war  standard.  Production  in  the 
individual  factory  had  fallen  off  from  10  to  20  per  cent 
of  the  pre-war  level  but  was  much  better  than  two  years 
ago.  In  the  textile  industry  as  a  whole,  however,  produc¬ 
tion  is  scarcely  a  fifth  of  what  it  was  in  1913. 

Concerning  the  settlement  of  labor  disagreements  we 
found  more  disputes  and  less  strikes  in  Russia  than  in 
almost  any  other  industrial  country.  The  right  to  strike 
is  maintained  both  in  state  and  private  enterprises,  but 
recourse  to  arbitration  is  compulsory  before  a  strike  can  be 
declared. 

In  spite  of  low  wages  in  Russia  today  the  cost  of  liv¬ 
ing  is  much  higher  than  before  the  war.  My  first  meal 
in  a  Moscow  hotel  with  two  courses  for  two  person'1  cost 
over  $5.00  gold.  A  pair  of  shoe  laces  cost  me  65,000,000 
roubles.  The  face  value  of  this  before  the  war  would  have 
been  a  fortune  of  $32,500,000,  but  with  roubles  at  480,- 
000,000  to  the  dollar,  and  falling  daily,  the  cost  of  the 
shoe  laces  in  American  money  was  about  thirteen  cents. 
My  first  street  car  fare  was  26,000,000  rubles.  For  half 
a  large  loaf  of  bread  I  paid  96,000,000  roubles.  A  pound 
of  tea  costs  from  $1.00  to  $4.00,  or  over  480,000,000  roubles, 
and  a  cheap  suit  of  clothes  12,000,000,000. 

The  writer  found  much  discontent  among  unskilled  and 
poorly  paid  workers  outside  the  ranks  of  the  Communist 
Party.  Within  this  favored  group,  industry,  the  govern¬ 
ment,  everything  is  theirs  and  utopia  lies  just  over  the  brow 
of  the  next  hill.  The  two  chief  causes  of  complaint  on  the 
part  of  non-Communists,  however,  were  poor  pay  and  lack 
of  liberty.  Voting  is  not  by  secret  ballot  but  openly.  Any¬ 
one  is  free  to  oppose  if  he  dares  to  become  a  marked  man, 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA  101 


vote  against  the  policy  of  the  Party  and  take  the  conse¬ 
quences.  The  lowered  voice  and  furtive  glance  often  bore 
witness  to  the  shadow  of  the  Terror  that  still  lingers  in  the 
memory.  One  quiet  but  fearless  worker  testified  to  having 
been  imprisoned  four  times  under  the  present  government 
and  fourteen  times  in  his  lifetime,  because  he  dared  to 
stand  for  his  principles. 

We  met  no  working  men  in  all  Russia,  however,  who, 
even  for  increased  wages,  would  be  willing  to  return  to 
the  regime  of  the  Czar  or  of  Liberalism  after  the  first 
revolution.  Poor  as  it  is,  it  remains  a  workingman's  gov¬ 
ernment,  in  many  respects  nearer  the  people  than  any  other 
in  the  world.  Even  among  the  bourgeoisie  I  found  a  grow¬ 
ing  number  who  feel  that  their  early  sabotage  against  the 
government  was  a  great  mistake,  that  their  trust  in  futile 
British  and  French  intervention  had  been  disastrous  and 
that  there  is  no  other  possible  government  in  sight  that  can 
maintain  law  and  order.  They  say  the  whole  country  is 
sick  of  war  and  revolution,  and  that  they  should  now  loyally 
co-operate  with  the  government  in  its  present  progressive 
policy  and  hope  for  a  growing  measure  of  liberty  in  the 
future. 

The  truth  is  that  Russia  has  never  yet  known  liberty,  nor 
enjoyed  a  government  sure  enough  of  itself  and  of  its 
principles  to  allow  the  free  criticism  of  enlightened  public 
opinion  and  a  free  press.  The  entire  press  today  with  all 
its  sources  of  news  and  editorial  interpretation  of  events 
is  the  controlled  mouthpiece  of  the  state.  With  the  in¬ 
creasing  stability  and  confidence  of  the  present  government 
there  is  more  freedom.  But  no  system  will  ever  commend 
itself  to  well  paid,  well  housed,  educated  Anglo-Saxon 
workers  who  have  tasted  hard-won  liberty,  if  it  can  only 
maintain  itself  by  an  iron  dictatorship  of  force,  and  dare 


102  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

not  trust  truth  to  the  full  blaze  of  democratic  discussion  and 
opposition. 

The  money  of  the  new  system  is  of  three  kinds:  side  by 
side  with  the  depreciated  paper  currency  there  is  the 
stabilized  currency  upon  a  gold  basis.  One  paper  cher- 
vonetz,  or  ten  gold  roubles,  is  worth  a  little  more  than  an 
English  pound  or  a  little  less  than  $5.00.  Workmen  are 
frequently  paid,  however,  and  wage  agreements  calculated 
in  the  “tovarni,”  commodity  or  goods  rouble.  This  is  based 
upon  the  index  figure  of  fifteen  principal  articles,  and 
represents,  therefore,  a  real  wage  which  will  always  pur¬ 
chase  the  same  amount  of  supplies.  At  present  one  tovarni 
rouble  is  equivalent  to  about  two  gold  roubles  in  Moscow. 
Thus  Russia  has  already  adopted  this  scientific  method  of 
payment,  similar  to  the  plan  proposed  by  Professor  Irving 
Fisher  of  Yale  for  stabilizing  the  dollar,  which  still  seems 
distant  and  utopian  in  progressive  America. 

We  found  Russia  a  land  of  organized  labor  and  trade 
unions,  and  they  have  greater  power  than  in  any  other 
country  in  the  world.  Representation  on  the  All-Russian 
Congress  of  Soviets  is  in  the  proportion  of  one  worker  to 
every  25,000  electors  in  the  towns,  but  only  one  peasant 
to  every  125,000  from  the  provinces,  thus  giving  the  in¬ 
dustrial  workers  proportionally  five  times  as  many  delegates 
as  the  farmers.  It  is  a  workingman’s  government  and 
country. 

This  is  often  indignantly  denied  by  those  who  claim  that 
it  is  a  government  of  intellectuals,  and  that  the  workers 
are  the  mere  pawns  of  this  oligarchy,  but  in  the  estima¬ 
tion  of  the  writer  this  is  not  true.  The  sources  of  informa¬ 
tion  and  interpretation  for  most  American  visitors  and 
readers  are  the  old  dispossessed  bourgeoise  class,  who  are 
not  unprejudiced  witnesses.  It  is  true  that  they  have  been 
often  cruelly  treated.  We  saw  men  of  this  class  loyally 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA  103 


trying  to  work  with  the  present  government,  but  who  were 
held  under  suspicion  by  it  and  who  were  allowed  neither 
employment  within  Russia  nor  permission  to  leave  the 
country.  From  the  point  of  view  of  this  class  alone  the 
present  government  is  indeed  cruelly  unjust,  but  from  the 
standpoint  of  the  long-exploited  masses  it  is  a  prodigious 
effort  at  emancipation  and  justice.  Most  of  us  are  too 
bitter  and  partisan,  too  near  to  the  events  in  question  to 
see  the  movement  in  perspective  as  we  now  can  see  the 
French  Revolution.  Strangely  enough  we  now  view  this 
movement  with  the  same  horror  and  indignation  as  the 
royalists  of  France  did  the  French  Revolution,  and  as  the 
aristocracy  of  England  viewed  the  rebellion  of  the  ungrate¬ 
ful  colonists  in  America. 

Uqder  the  autocratic  Czarist  regime  it  was  illegal  to  be  a 
member  of  a  trade  union  prior  to  1905,  and  free  labor 
organizations  and  strikes  were  strictly  prohibited.  It  was 
the  power  of  repressed  organized  labor  driven  underground 
that  finally  broke  in  volcanic  upheaval,  organized  its 
Soviets  and  led  the  revolution  for  the  overthrow  of  the 
old  order. 

In  February,  1917,  there  were  only  three  trade  unions  in 
Russia  with  a  membership  of  1,385.  Upon  gaining  their 
liberty,  within  six  months  a  thousand  labor  organizations 
had  enrolled  some  two  million  members.  In  1923  there  were 
4,828,000  members,  including  workers  by  hand  and  brain 
in  industry,  agriculture,  the  professions  and  government 
employment.1 

The  personnel  of  the  Soviet  Government  is  drawn  chiefly 
from  the  ranks  of  labor.  Within  the  Communist  Party  55 
per  cent  are  from  the  industrial  workers,  30  per  cent  are 

1  Labor  statistics  in  this  chapter  are  taken  whenever  possible  from  the  publications 
of  the  All-Russian  Central  Soviet  of  Labor  Unions,  and  State  Department  of  Labor 
translated  from  the  Russian.  Numbers  1  to  6,  1923. 


104 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


peasants,  and  15  per  cent  are  intellectuals.  Although 
fourteen  out  of  the  sixteen  Peoples’  Commissars  of  two  years 
ago  were  professional  men  or  university  graduates,  yet  this 
class  is  held  under  suspicion  unless  they  have  been  seasoned 
in  prison  or  enlisted  in  the  cause  before  the  revolution  of 
1905.  The  trade  unions  are  an  integral  part  of  the  ma¬ 
chinery  of  state  organization.  They  have  their  represen¬ 
tatives  in  nearly  all  important  industrial  and  political 
bodies.  They  have  the  right  to  nominate  candidates  for 
nearly  all  important  offices  in  industry  or  government,  in 
the  management  of  each  factory  and  trust.  By  the  Labor 
Code  of  1922  they  are  given  large  powers  in  fixing  wages, 
working  hours  and  conditions  of  labor.  Where  labor 
demands,  as  it  frequently  does,  increased  wages,  shorter 
hours  or  better  working  conditions,  labor  also,  as  rep¬ 
resented  in  industrial  management  and  government  must 
answer  the  question,  Where  is  the  money  to  come  from? 
As  yet  there  has  never  been  enough  to  go  round,  never 
enough  to  carry  out  the  reforms  for  education,  social  in¬ 
surance,  and  increased  wages  which  all  desire.  The  worker 
in  Russia  has  more  power  and  less  wages  than  in  other  in¬ 
dustrial  countries.  Thus  far  he  has  succeeded  in  securing 
favorable  labor  legislation  and  industrial  and  political  con¬ 
trol,  but  not  in  the  production  of  enough  “surplus  value” 
to  improve  his  economic  condition. 

Members  of  the  trade  unions  are  given  special  privilege 
in  education,  in  schools  for  workers  to  prepare  them  for 
the  universities,  to  which  they  must  be  admitted  after  a 
three-year  course  without  examination. 

The  government  has  aimed  at  and  achieved  a  large 
measure  of  social  equalization.  In  general,  a  single  standard 
of  living  has  been  established.  Apart  from  a  few  secret 
profiteers  no  gross  inequalities  of  fortune  exist,  for  the 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA  105 


reason  that  all  are  poor  together.  Life  has  been  levelled 
down  rather  than  up.  Lenine  and  the  Soviet  leaders  get 
a  salary  not  exceeding  two  dollars  a  day,  with  certain 
allowances  and  privileges.  They  are  men  of  simple  life, 
who  daily  sacrifice  for  a  cause  that  has  for  them  the  force 
of  a  religion.  But  in  many  respects  the  early  decrees  and 
efforts  of  the  Party  to  achieve  power,  privilege  and  comfort 
for  the  working  class  have  failed. 

In  some  cases,  such  as  social  insurance,  the  legislation 
remains  but  is  still  partially  ineffective,  owing  to  insuffi¬ 
cient  funds.  In  other  cases  new  legislation  has  withdrawn 
the  privileges  granted  to  the  workers,  which  proved  harm¬ 
ful  or  impossible  of  fulfillment.  An  example  of  this  is 
found  in  workers’  control  of  the  factories.  This  was  tried 
and  proved  a  failure  under  existing  conditions,  as  it  did 
later  in  Italy,  and  as  it  did  in  the  Russian  army  when  sol¬ 
diers’  committees  endeavored  to  take  the  place  of  the  offi¬ 
cers.  It  is  difficult  to  conduct  an  orchestra  by  a  divided 
committee  or  soviet;  someone  has  to  beat  time  and  be  the 
sole  director  for  the  moment. 

On  November  14,  1917,  a  Workers’  Control  Decree  gave 
the  workers  almost  complete  supervision  of  industries,  in¬ 
cluding  the  purchase  and  sale  of  raw  materials  and  manu¬ 
factures.  After  disastrous  experiences  of  mismanagement, 
in  May,  1921,  the  law  was  repealed,  workers’  control  was 
abolished,  individual  management  was  restored  and  in  some 
instances  former  owners  were  put  in  charge.  On  December 
28,  1921,  the  central  committee  of  the  Communist  Party,  in 
agreement  with  the  All-Russian  Central  Council  of  Trade 
Unions,  adopted  the  following  resolution  covering  large- 
scale  industry:  “Conditions  in  Russia  unquestionably  de¬ 
mand  concentration  of  all  power  in  the  hands  of  the  man¬ 
agement  of  the  factories.  The  direct  intervention  of 


10  6 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


trade  unions  in  the  management  of  undertakings  is  also 
inadmissible.”1 

There  is  now  a  steady  evolutionary  development  of  labor 
within  revolutionary  Russia.  Forced  labor  has  been  abol¬ 
ished.  Membership  in  a  trade  union  is  no  longer  compul¬ 
sory,  but  it  is  almost  universal  because  there  are  so  many 
advantages  of  membership  and  such  limitations  placed 
upon  “free”  labor.  Strikes  are  no  longer  forbidden  as  anti¬ 
revolutionary.  Competition  is  now  resorted  to  between  the 
state  and  co-operative  and  private  industries,  while  scien¬ 
tific  management,  piece  work,  special  rewards  for  excellence 
and  many  other  devices  to  stimulate  production  are  re¬ 
sorted  to. 

There  is  also  a  growing  tendency  toward  the  recognition 
of  certain  rights  of  private  property  in  Russia.  In  a  decree 
of  the  All-Russian  Central  Executive  Council  in  May, 
1922,  citizens  were  granted  the  right  to  hold  property  which 
had  not  already  been  municipalized  and  to  transfer  it  by 
rental  contracts.  Private  persons  can  acquire  land  on  a 
forty-nine-year  lease  from  local  authorities  and  build  upon 
it.  Individuals  may  hold  all  movable  property,  including 
capital,  factories,  shops  and  personal  property.  Security 
of  copyright,  inventions  and  trade-marks  were  restored. 
Property  may  be  mortgaged  or  bequeathed  to  one’s  family 
up  to  the  value  of  $5,000.  Property  expropriated  by  revo¬ 
lutionary  laws  was  not  restored.  But  with  increased  inter¬ 
course  and  trade  relations  conditions  in  Russia  are  con¬ 
stantly  approximating  those  of  other  nations. 

An  impartial  perusal  of  Labor  Legislation  in  the  Labor 
Code  of  1922  reveals  the  fact  that  the  new  Government  of 
Russia  in  five  years  has  produced  a  more  advanced  body  of 
legislation  on  paper  than  many  other  countries  in  a  century. 

Almost  the  first  law  passed  was  for  an  eight-hour  day 


1  Labor  Conditions  in  Soviet  Russia.  International  Labor  Office,  Geneva,  pp.  48,  49. 


THE  RECONSTRUCTION  OF  RUSSIA  107 

and  a  forty-eight-hour  week,1  a  law  which  a  century 
after  the  industrial  revolution  has  never  been  enacted  in 
Britain  or  America.  Work  is  limited  to  8  hours  for  day 
work,  7  for  night  work  and  6  for  unhealthy  industries. 
Every  worker  has  the  right  to  a  weekly  rest  of  42  hours,  if 
possible  on  Sunday.  Women  are  safeguarded  from  night 
work,  overtime  and  unhealthy  industries.  Provision  on  full 
wages  is  made  for  mothers  for  8  weeks  before  and  8  weeks 
after  confinement.  Creches  or  homes  are  provided  for  the 
children  of  workers. 

For  young  persons  the  normal  working  day  must  not  ex¬ 
ceed  6  hours  from  16  to  18  years,  and  4  hours  for  14  to  16. 
Children  under  14  are  not  allowed  to  work.2  In  glaring 
contrast  to  the  factories  in  China,  Japan,  and  the  backward 
states  in  America,  the  writer  saw  no  child  workers  in  any 
factory  in  Russia. 

An  elaborate  plan  of  Social  Insurance  is  provided  by 
levying  from  12  to  28  per  cent  of  the  wage  bill  upon  all 
industries,  state  or  private.  This  covers  the  cost  of  sick¬ 
ness,  accidents,  incapacity  for  work,  forced  unemployment, 
confinement  for  women,  old  age  and  burial.  “The  Russian 
proletariat  has  taken  as  its  motto  the  complete  social  insur¬ 
ance  of  salaried  workers  as  well  as  the  poor  in  the  towns 
and  villages.”  Until  industry  becomes  more  profitable, 
however,  and  more  successful  in  production,  funds  are  in¬ 
adequate  for  the  fulfillment  of  more  than  a  part  of  this 
program. 

We  may  look  upon  Russia  as  a  vast  laboratory  for  social 
experiment .  In  a  world  fettered  and  bound  by  conserva¬ 
tive  custom  and  tradition,  with  its  incubus  and  inheritance 

1  Izvestia,  October  31,  1917,  No.  212.  Authorization  for  work  overtime  in’certain 
cases  specified  by  law  may  be  obtained  temporarily  through  the  trade  union  or  labor 
inspectorate  for  men  over  eighteen. 

2  The  labor  laws  in  this  chapter  are  taken  from  the  Russian  Labor  Code  published 
in  1922. 


108 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


of  medievalism  and  absolutism,  its  uncorrected  results  of  a 
laissez-faire  industrial  revolution,  its  enormous  injustices 
and  inequalities,  its  masses  often  in  poverty  and  ignorance, 
without  adequate  opportunity  for  expression  or  self-realiza¬ 
tion,  it  may  be  of  some  real  value  to  have  at  least  one  coun¬ 
try  free  to  test  certain  theories  by  a  system  of  trial  and 
error.  In  so  far  as  they  are  true  they  will  eventually  suc¬ 
ceed,  but  where  they  are  false  they  will  finally  fail.  If  we 
have  open  minds  we  shall  learn  much  both  from  the  success 
and  failure  of  the  good  and  the  evil  in  Russia.  We  repeat 
that  even  as  they  had  the  sagacity  to  profit  by  their  mis¬ 
takes  and  adopt  a  new  economic  policy,  so  they  and  the 
new  world  of  labor  may  yet  learn  valuable  lessons  in  this 
great  laboratory  of  life.  If  Russia  finally  succeeds  in¬ 
dustrially  she  will  make  a  profound  impression  upon  the 
world. 


Chapter  V 

THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST 

A  general  survey  of  present  economic  conditions  in  China 
and  Japan  and  India  reveals  the  fact  that  Asia  is  in  the 
beginning  of  a  great  industrial  revolution,  and  presents  a 
situation  strikingly  similar  to  that  in  England  a  century 
and  more  ago.  We  see  the  same  long  hours,  low  wages, 
bad  housing,  inhuman  conditions  and  terrific  poverty  in  the 
industrial  cities  of  the  East  that  prevailed  in  the  West  be¬ 
fore  the  reforms  of  the  last  century.  Can  these  conditions 
be  radically  improved?  Can  Asia  be  saved  from  the  mis¬ 
takes  of  the  West,  or  must  the  workers  toil  through  the 
same  long  period  of  exploitation  and  misery? 

In  passing  from  Asia  to  western  Europe  one  enters  not 
only  a  different  continent  but  another  century.  To  under¬ 
stand  the  change  we  shall  briefly  review  the  evolution  of 
labor  in  the  West.  A  survey  of  the  past  in  its  broad  general 
outlines  reveals  such  an  unmistakable  movement  of  prog¬ 
ress  that  it  should  fill  us  with  hope  for  the  future  of  in¬ 
dustry  in  Orient  and  Occident  alike.  A  true  reading  of 
history  includes  not  merely  the  brilliant  achievements  of 
a  few  exceptional  individuals,  but  the  mighty  upward 
struggle  of  the  dumb  masses  to  freedom.  The  story  of  the 
rise  of  labor  must  be  traced  slowly  up  from  slavery,  serf¬ 
dom  and  poverty,  through  the  medieval  feudal  system 
and  the  agrarian  and  industrial  revolutions,  to  the  achieve¬ 
ment  of  political  liberty  and  the  gradual  growth  of  in¬ 
dustrial  democracy,  that  have  won  for  labor  its  present 
position  in  the  West. 


109 


110 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


If  we  trace  man’s  economic  evolution  through  the  hunting, 
pastoral,  agricultural,  handicraft  and  industrial  stages,  we 
often  find  that  the  story  of  organized  manual  labor  begins 
in  slavery ,  a  condition  as  old  as  human  history.  The  great 
pyramid  in  Egypt  built  some  five  thousand  years  ago  stands 
as  the  earliest  remaining  monument  erected  by  slave  labor. 
Slavery  is  based  upon  the  desire  “to  use  the  bodily  powers 
of  another  person  as  a  means  of  ministering  to  one’s  own 
ease  or  pleasure.”1  This  desire  to  exploit  labor  for  selfish 
purposes  has  persisted  from  the  days  of  slavery  down  to 
the  present.  Finding  slavery  as  an  established  institution, 
Aristotle  and  the  Greeks  developed  a  philosophy  to  justify 
it.  The  Romans  gave  it  foundation  in  the  legal  fiction  of 
a  supposed  agreement  between  the  victor  and  the  van¬ 
quished,  in  which  the  latter  accepted  the  mercy  of  perpetual 
slavery  in  lieu  of  the  life  he  had  forfeited  in  battle.  This 
was  the  beginning  of  that  long  unbroken  series  of  interested 
explanations  and  comfortable  philosophies  to  justify  “man’s 
inhumanity  to  man,”  and  salve  the  conscience  of  the  privi¬ 
leged  few  for  the  wrongs  of  the  enslaved  many. 

Under  Roman  law  the  slave  became  more  and  more  a 
chattel  or  thing,  divested  alike  of  rights  and  duties.  Basing 
the  status  of  the  slave  upon  the  theory  of  capture  in  battle, 
the  absolute  right  of  life  and  death  was  supposed  to  remain 
with  the  master.  The  very  inhumanity  of  the  system  was 
justified  as  relatively  merciful.  The  majority  were  usually 
kindly  treated  just  as  animals  are  today,  but  it  was  not  by 
legal  right  but  merely  by  the  mercy  of  the  master.  The 
slave  was  “his  property”  and  he  could  do  as  he  liked  with 
him  regardless  of  the  welfare  of  the  individual  worker  or 
society.  The  master  owned  the  worker.  Property  was 

1  Gilbert  Stone,  “A  History  of  Labour,”  p.  25.  We  are  especially  indebted  in  this 
chapter  to  this  volume,  to  Webb’s  History  of  Trade  Unionism,  Hammond’s  “The/Town 
Labourer,”  and  “The  Village  Labourer.” 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  111 


supreme,  not  persons.  The  slave  could  legally  be  sold  or 
given  away,  bequeathed  as  any  other  thing,  treated  kindly 
or  cruelly  at  the  pleasure  of  his  owner.  The  fact  that 
prevailingly  so  many  were  kindly  treated  did  not  justify 
a  system  which  gave  to  one  man,  by  virtue  of  a  theory  of 
unlimited  personal  property,  such  enormous  power  over  the 
lives  of  others.  The  slave  could  become  a  persona  or 
human  being  only  by  a  legal  act  of  emancipation.  He  was 
even  excluded  from  the  worship  of  the  Roman  deities  other 
than  the  god  of  slaves.  If  a  slave  was  suspected  of  crime, 
his  evidence  was  obtained  by  torture  and  if  he  informed 
against  his  master,  even  as  late  as  the  time  of  Constantine, 
he  was  crucified  without  trial.  Nero  confirmed  the  custom 
that  if  a  slave  killed  his  master  all  the  slaves  in  the  house 
were  to  be  put  to  death. 

The  slave  could  not  legally  marry.  His  wife  and  children 
were  not  his  before  the  law.  Slaves  had  no  power  of  in¬ 
dividual  or  collective  bargaining,  no  control  over  their  own 
circumstances  or  destinies.  They  were  at  the  mercy  of 
another.  Yet  this  was  the  system  justified  for  eighteen 
centuries  by  philosophers,  historians,  theologians  and 
churchmen,  blinded  by  their  own  interests,  alike  upon 
grounds  of  Scripture  and  of  reason,  and  as  late  as  1923 
there  is  a  movement  to  abolish  the  system  in  the  mandated 
territories  of  Africa. 

Gradually  the  almost  unlimited  rights  of  the  masters  were 
circumscribed  and  those  of  the  slaves  increased.  They 
began  to  develop  the  ancient  collegia,  or  friendly  societies 
of  slaves,  providing  them  free  burial  and  certain  other 
privileges.  These  in  certain  respects  forecast  the  medieval 
social  guilds,  and  modern  labor  organizations.  Under  the 
influence  of  Christianity  the  condition  of  the  slave  was 
gradually  improved  by  a  growing  body  of  humane  legisla¬ 
tion,  until  slavery  was  finally  abolished. 


112 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


Slavery  gradually  gave  place  to  serfdom  which  lasted 
almost  until  modern  times.  Feudalism  had  developed  in 
England  by  the  ninth  century.  By  a  convenient  theory 
all  the  land  was  supposed  to  be  the  personal  property  of 
the  King  by  divine  right.  In  return  for  grants  of  land 
his  tenants  or  subjects  pledged  their  loyalty  and  service. 
The  lords  of  the  manors  in  turn  divided  their  holdings 
among  smaller  tenants,  whether  free  men  or  serfs.  Under 
this  system  the  serf  had  rights  which  the  slave  never  had. 

I  He  was  protected  against  all  men  except  his  lord.  Like  the 
slave  he  was  usually  kindly  treated  but  he  could  be  sold, 
given  away  or  have  his  personal  property  seized  by  his 
master.  The  law  gave  no  protection  to  the  honor  of  female 
serfs  against  their  lord.  The  serf  remained  in  dense  and 
unbroken  ignorance.  He  often  had  no  motive  for  work 
save  that  of  fear.  He  was  not  his  own  but  was  wholly 
dependent  upon  the  will  of  another.  The  lord  usually 
looked  upon  “the  unfree  child  as  so  much  livestock.”  He 
controlled  equally  property  and  persons,  the  land  and  the 
serfs  upon  it.  Serfs  could  be  protected,  however,  from 
maiming  or  death  just  as  animals  are  now.  Even  as  late 
as  the  tenth  century  man  was  still  a  cheap  commodity.  The 
price  of  a  linen  shirt  was  equal  to  that  of  a  slave,  and  a 
fine  piece  of  armour  more  than  ten  serfs,  or  fifty  cattle.  At 
this  time  the  majority  of  the  long  handicapped  class  of 
manual  workers  were  either  slaves  or  seifs. 

But  gradually  a  change  took  place.  It  was  found  that 
unfree  labor  whether  of  the  slave  or  serf  was  not  efficient 
or  profitable.  From  the  twelfth  century  the  serfs  became 
a  dying  class.  With  the  awakening  of  a  new  conscience 
in  England  there  gradually  came  a  growing  conviction 
against  serfdom,  as  previously  there  had  been  against 
slavery.  The  twelfth  century  marked  the  dawn  of  a  new 
era.  With  the  rise  of  the  free  towns  of  Europe  the  relation 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  113 


of  lord  and  serf  gradually  gave  way  to  that  of  master  and 
worker. 

The  growth  of  a  strong  central  government  gave  protec¬ 
tion  and  safety  to  the  manual  worker  who  had  so  long 
been  helplessly  dependent  upon  his  owner  or  master.  The 
Crusades  helped  to  break  the  hardened  crust  of  dead  cus¬ 
tom.  They  brought  in  new  ideas  and  new  learning  which 
finally  led  to  the  Renaissance  with  its  awakening  and 
emancipation  of  the  human  mind.  Thus  began  a  move¬ 
ment  lasting  from  the  twelfth  to  the  fifteenth  century, 
marked  by  the  rise  of  a  middle  class,  the  development  of 
craft  and  industry,  the  growth  of  the  free  cities  as  trading 
communities,  and  the  beginning  of  the  emancipation  of  the 
masses.  We  shall  study  the  movement  chiefly  in  England 
as  the  home  of  political  liberty  and  later  the  source  of  the 
industrial  revolution. 

The  center  of  social  life  now  gradually  shifted  from  the 
manor  of  the  feudal  lord  to  the  free  town  of  trade,  and 
of  primitive  industry.  Three  centuries  record  the  patient 
efforts  of  the  common  people  in  the  development  of  free 
municipalities,  in  the  widening  of  the  circle  of  royal  pro¬ 
tection  and  justice,  to  raise  the  status  of  the  masses  from 
serfdom  to  freedom.  With  the  growth  of  freedom  came 
the  increase  both  of  population  and  prosperity.  With  liberty 
man  began  to  enter  upon  his  long-withheld  birthright. 

Under  the  guild  system  apprentices  were  bound  for  pe¬ 
riods  usually  from  eight  to  twelve  years,  receiving  food  and 
clothing  and  a  fixed  sum  at  the  end  of  the  term.  They 
worked  from  sunrise  to  sunset.  Wages  in  the  fourteenth 
century  were  from  four  to  eight  cents  a  day,  while  food 
cost  four  cents  a  day  for  a  worker.  The  Justices  estab¬ 
lished  maximum  wages  to  protect  the  consumer  but  not 
minimum  wages  to  protect  the  producer.  By  the  sixteenth 


114 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


century  the  serf  was  almost  completely  emancipated;  trade 
and  industry  were  flourishing. 

Poverty  marked  the  third  stage  in  the  long  story  of  the 
suffering  of  manual  labor.  The  evils  of  slavery  and  serf¬ 
dom  were  now  followed  by  even  greater  suffering  and  want. 
The  worker  gained  personal  but  not  economic  freedom. 
In  the  sixteenth  century  the  movement  began  of  enclosing 
thousands  of  acres  of  the  common  land  which  the  poor 
farmer,  free  or  serf,  had  for  centuries  enjoyed.  Peasants 
were  driven  from  the  land.  Some  300,000  workers  were 
thrown  out  of  employment  and  poverty  became  widespread. 
Unemployment  and  want  drove  the  workers  to  rebellion  in 
1549.  But  this  only  ended  in  defeat  and  brought  no  relief 
to  labor.  “Merry  England”  was  now  passing  into  a  land 
of  large  estates  and  poorhouses.  Instead  of  providing  for 
the  unemployed  who  had  been  thrown  out  of  work  by  the 
existing  social  system,  they  were  penalized  by  severe  legis¬ 
lation  so  that  “sturdy  beggars”  were  to  be  thrashed  “till 
the  body  was  bloody.” 

Thousands  of  peasants  driven  homeless  from  the  land 
became  fugitives  or  “vagabonds.”  The  harshness  of  the 
Justices  in  some,  districts  also  caused  migration.  Cruel 
laws  were  passed  to  prevent  the  free  movement  of  workers, 
fugitive  laborers,  or  artificers.  If  caught  they  could  be 
branded  on  the  forehead  or  even  enslaved.  The  Govern¬ 
ment  seemed  to  contemplate  a  return  to  slavery  for,  by  an 
Act  of  Edward  VI *s  reign  in  1547,  it  was  ordered  that  any 
man  or  woman  who  lived  idly  for  three  days,  who  should 
refuse  to  labor,  should  be  branded  with  a  redhot  iron  on 
the  breast  with  the  letter  V  and  should  become  the  slave 
for  two  years  of  any  person  informing  against  him.  The 
master  could  feed  his  slave  on  bread  and  water  and  refuse 
meat.  He  had  the  legal  right  to  force  him  to  do  any  work 
with  whip  and  chains.  If  the  slave  were  absent  a  fortnight, 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  115 

he  could  be  condemned  to  slavery  for  life  and  branded  on 
the  forehead  or  back.  If  he  ran  away  thrice,  he  was  to 
be  executed.1 

There  were  also  laws  against  combinations  of  laborers  to 
improve  their  conditions  which  made  offenders  liable  to 
fine,  the  pillory,  loss  of  an  ear,  etc.  These  men  existed  not 
in  their  own  right  but  as  “a  means  of  ministering”  to  the 
“ease  or  pleasure”  of  another  class.  Laws  were  framed 
for  the  protection  of  the  property  of  this  class,  not  for  the 
personality  of  men  of  another  class. 

The  discovery  of  the  new  world  by  Columbus  opened  up 
new  sources  of  wealth  but  they  were  not  for  the  poor. 
Many  were  driven  by  hunger  to  the  gallows,  and  in  the 
reign  of  Henry  VIII  alone,  72,000  persons  were  put  to  death 
for  stealing,  often  for  petty  theft  to  appease  their  hunger. 
Poverty  was  accompanied  by  the  dense  ignorance  of  the 
masses.  Education  was  confined  chiefly  to  gentlemen  and 
the  clergy.  At  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century 
unskilled  or  common  workmen  received  a  little  less  than 
two  cents  a  day,  or  $6.66  a  year,  while  skilled  workers  re¬ 
ceived  three  cents  a  day,  or  $10.00  a  year.  These  were 
“maximum”  rates. 

By  the  agrarian  and  industrial  revolutions,  England  was 
changed  in  one  eventful  century  from  a  country  of  farming 
into  a  land  of  smoky  cities  and  factories.  Both  move¬ 
ments  led  to  the  great  future  prosperity  of  England,  but 
both  at  the  time  wrought  incalculable  hardship  to  multi¬ 
tudes  of  workers.  The  agrarian  revolution  turned  the  peas¬ 
ant  proprietor  into  a  dependent  agricultural  laborer  or 
drove  him  as  a  homeless  wanderer  from  the  land.  The 
industrial  revolution  forced  him  into  the  factory. 

The  Enclosure  Acts,  which  dispossessed  the  workers, 


*  “A  History  of  Labour,”  pp.  59,  96. 1 


116 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


could,  up  to  1774,  be  passed  by  the  limited  franchise  of  the 
favored  few,  without  the  people  concerned  even  hearing 
that  their  eviction  from  the  land  was  contemplated.  Legis¬ 
lation  was  enacted  chiefly  by  the  property-holding  classes 
and  naturally  in  their  own  interests.  The  masses  without 
the  vote  were  politically  powerless.  The  enclosure  of  the 
common  land  had  left  many  of  them  in  abject  poverty. 
Village  laborers  were  receiving  from  sixty  to  ninety  cents 
a  week  in  wages.  Hunger  and  want  drove  many  of  them 
to  poaching  in  the  rich  game  preserves  for  food.  Cobbett 
tells  of  a  young  man  working  at  breaking  stones  who  when 
asked  how  he  could  live  upon  sixty-two  cents  a  week  re¬ 
plied:  “I  don’t  live  upon  it.  I  poach;  it  is  better  to  be 
hanged  than  to  be  starved  to  death.”1 

In  the  three  years  between  1827  and  1830,  8,502  per¬ 
sons  were  convicted  under  the  Game  Laws,  or  one  in  seven 
of  all  criminal  convictions.  Most  were  driven  to  crime  by 
sheer  want.  The  woods  were  strewn  with  deadly  spring 
guns  that  dealt  death  without  warning.  One  man  testified 
to  the  judge  at  his  trial  for  poaching  before  being  hanged: 
“Sir,  I  had  a  pregnant  wife,  with  one  infant  at  her  knee, 
and  another  at  her  breast;  I  was  anxious  to  obtain  work, 
I  offered  myself  in  all  directions,  but  without  success.  .  .  . 
I  was  allowed.  .  .  .  What?  Why,  for  myself,  my 

babes,  and  my  wife,  in  a  condition  requiring  more  than 
common  support  and  unable  to  labour,  I  was  allowed  seven 
shillings  ($1.75)  a  week  for  all;  for  which  I  was  expected 
to  work  on  the  roads  from  light  to  dark,  and  to  pay  three 
guineas  ($15.00)  for  the  hovel  which  sheltered  us.”2 

Every  suggestion  to  alter  the  laws  in  favor  of  the  poor 
met  with  indignant  opposition.  The  great  Burke  well 


1  The  Village  Labourer,  p.  167. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  169. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  117 


stated  the  social  philosophy  of  the  time.  “The  body  of 
the  people  .  .  .  must  respect  that  property  of  which 

they  cannot  partake.  They  must  labour  to  obtain  what 
by  labour  can  be  obtained;  and  when  they  find,  as  they 
commonly  do,  the  success  disproportioned  to  the  endeavour, 
they  must  be  taught  their  consolation  in  the  final  propor¬ 
tions  of  eternal  justice.”  It  was  the  dictum  of  the  time 
that  the  poor  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  laws  but  to  obey 
them. 

The  Hammonds  conclude  the  description  of  the  Village 
Laborer  of  the  time  by  a  contrast  of  the  brilliant  accom¬ 
plishments  and  sparkling  wit  of  the  class  of  privilege  with 
the  “dim  and  meagre  records  of  the  disinherited  peasants 
that  are  the  shadow  of  its  wealth;  of  the  exiled  labourers 
that  are  the  shadow  of  its  pleasures ;  of  the  villages  sinking 
in  poverty  and  crime  and  shame  that  are  the  shadow  of  its 
power  and  its  pride.”1 

The  industrial  revolution  that  transformed  England  be¬ 
tween  1760  and  1832  was  the  beginning  of  a  vast  world 
movement  that  was  to  affect  first  Europe,  then  America 
and  finally  Asia. 

The  agrarian  revolution  as  we  have  seen,  had  driven  the 
rural  worker  from  the  land,  the  mechanical  revolution 
enabled  man  to  harness  the  power  first  of  water  and  then 
of  steam  to  the  new  inventions  for  increased  mass  produc¬ 
tion;  while  the  social  and  financial  development  produced 
the  transformation  known  as  the  industrial  revolution. 
This  vast  change  embraced  the  displacement  of  labor  from 
agriculture  to  industry,  the  massing  of  large  populations  in 
the  cities,  the  speeding  up  of  work,  the  mechanical  dis¬ 
cipline  of  life,  the  lessening  of  leisure,  the  increase  of  “free” 


Ilbid.,  pp.  247,  265,  274,  308. 


118 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


and  fierce  competition,  and  the  rise  of  a  capitalist  and  a 
proletarian  class. 

After  the  discovery  of  Watt’s  steam  engine  in  1765,  the 
power  of  steam  from  coal  was  harnessed  to  the  needs  of 
man.  This  power  was  applied  in  turn  to  the  production 
of  cotton,  wool,  iron  and  steel.  Labor  no  longer  was  inde¬ 
pendent  with  its  simple  tools,  but  was  gradually  massed  in 
city  factories  requiring  large  capital,  plant  and  credit.  The 
cities  were  gradually  linked  together  in  a  network  of  indus¬ 
trial  life  by  railways,  steamships,  cables,  telegraphs  and 
telephones. 

Massed  production  wrought  massed  wealth.  But  while 
man  mastered  matter  he  became  also  its  slave.  Though  he 
drove  his  machine,  it  in  turn  drove  him.  While  wages  in¬ 
creased,  life  in  many  ways  was  cheapened.  The  machine 
made  wealth  but  it  divided  men. 

The  sunny  fields  of  England  gave  place  to  the  “black 
country”  of  smoke  and  dirt.  With  the  congestion  of  the 
city,  and  its  cheap  crowded  dwellings  around  the  over¬ 
crowded  factory,  came  that  spawn  of  the  industrial  revolu¬ 
tion,  the  city  slum.  England  today,  according  to  Mr. 
Lloyd  George,  is  still  a  country  with  three  and  a  half  mil¬ 
lions  in  its  slums  though  it  could  spend  fifty  billion  dollars 
for  the  last  war.  “Men  turned  their  cities  into  shambles 
of  childhood,  poverty  was  embittered,  civil  strife  in  mine, 
mill  and  factory  became  endemic,  wars  on  an  unprece¬ 
dented  scale  engaged  nations  and  groups  of  nations.”1 

Man  has  already  harnessed  by  machinery  a  hundred  and 
fifty  million  horsepower  from  the  energy  of  coal  alone. 
But  he  has  not  yet  appropriated  the  spiritual  power  or 
moral  dynamic  to  utilize  this  material  energy  to  secure  the 
“good  life”  for  all.  The  industrial  revolution  which  might 


1  Bru6re,  “The  Coining  of  Coal,”  p.  2. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  119 

have  brought,  and  may  yet  ultimately  bring,  great  enrich¬ 
ment  to  the  common  life  was  at  first  used  too  often  as  a 
means  of  privilege  for  the  few  and  exploitation  of  the  many. 
It  increased  life  in  quantity,  but  in  quality  it  could  only  be 
adequately  augmented  by  a  spiritual  revolution.  The  in¬ 
dustrial  revolution  affected  England  from  the  middle  of 
the  eighteenth  century;  in  the  nineteenth  century  it  spread 
to  the  rest  of  Europe  and  America;  in  the  twentieth  cen¬ 
tury  it  is  beginning  to  transform  Asia. 

In  England  workers  began  in  the  mines  in  some  cases 
as  early  as  four  or  five  years  of  age.  Children  were  used 
as  chimney  sweeps  at  five  and  six  years.  The  Parliamen¬ 
tary  Committee  of  Investigation  found  that  many  were 
kidnapped  and  put  to  work.  “The  employment  of  chil¬ 
dren  on  a  vast  scale  became  the  most  important  social 
feature  of  English  life.”  Mr.  and  Mrs.  J.  L.  Hammond 
in  “The  Town  Labourer,”  drawing  their  account  from  the 
report  of  the  Parliamentary  Committee,  have  described 
how  children  were  used  like  animals  in  the  mines.  “A 
girdle  is  put  round  the  naked  waist,  to  which  a  chain  from 
the  carriage  is  hooked  and  passed  between  the  legs,  and 
the  boys  crawl  on  their  hands  and  knees,  drawing  the  car¬ 
riage  after  them.  .  .  .  Chained,  belted,  harnessed  like 

dogs  in  a  go-cart,  black,  saturated  with  wet,  and  more  than 
half  naked — crawling  upon  their  hands  and  feet,  and  drag¬ 
ging  their  heavy  loads  behind  them — they  present  an  ap¬ 
pearance  indescribably  disgusting  and  unnatural.”1 

It  was  not  the  children  of  the  poor  that  mattered  but 
the  divine  institution  of  property  for  the  rich  as  a  means 
of  their  comfort  and  luxury.  Its  greater  importance  is 
voiced  by  the  eloquent  Macaulay  as  “that  great  institution 
for  the  sake  of  which  chiefly  all  other  institutions  exist, 


i  Hammond,  “The  Town  Labourer,”  pp.  173,  174. 


120 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


that  great  institution  to  which  we  owe  all  knowledge,  all 
commerce,  all  industry,  all  civilization.”1 

A  century  ago  in  1819  twelve  hundred  cotton  workers  of 
Carlisle  protested  at  working  from  fourteen  to  seventeen 
hours  a  day  for  a  wage  of  five  to  seven  shillings  a  week,  or 
$1.75,  while  many  could  get  no  work  even  at  that  price 
for  their  destitute  families.  At  the  Felling  Pit,  boys 
worked  from  eighteen  to  twenty  hours  a  day.  At  Varley’s 
Mill  the  hours  in  summer  were  from  3:30  A.  M.  to  9.30 
P.  M.  One  of  the  employers  urged  that  “nothing  is  more 
favorable  to  morals  than  early  subordination.”2 

Some  four  hundred  masters  and  a  thousand  boys  were 
engaged  in  the  business  of  sweeping  chimneys.  They 
started  with  a  period  of  extreme  misery.  “Their  terror 
of  the  pitch-dark  and  often  suffocating  passage  had  to  be 
overcome  by  the  pressure  of  a  greater  terror  below.  In 
order  to  induce  them  to  climb  up  .  .  .  the  less  humane 

masters  would  set  straw  on  fire  below,  or  thrust  pins  into 
their  feet.  .  .  .  There  were  many  months  of  acute 
physical  suffering  from  the  sores  on  elbcws  and  knees. 
.  .  .  When  their  extremities  were  hardened  and  their 

fears  subdued,  they  settled  down  to  their  grimy  lives. 
.  .  .  A  witness  in  1788  stated  that  he  had  known  many 

boys  serve  four  or  five  years  without  being  once  washed.”3 

As  late  as  1818  chimneys  seven  inches  square  which  boys 
must  sweep  were  still  being  built.  “It  was,  in  fact,  in  big 
mansions  and  public  offices  that  the  difficult  chimneys  were 
found.  The  child  would  make  his  way  up  to  the  top 

1  Ibid.,  p.  320.  “Organized  industry  became,  as  it  were,  pock-marked  with  various 
evils  which  men  came  to  look  upon  as  natural  attributes  instead  of  what  in  truth  they 
were,  the  conseauences  of  non-natural  and  diseased  conditions.  An  attitude  of  mind 
grew  up  in  which  the  man  was  regarded  as  a  subject  for  exploitation  and  in  which  the 
master  was  regarded  as  an  exploiter.”  Stone,  “A  History  of  Labor,”  p.  320. 

2  Hammond,  “The  Town  Labourer,”  pp.  28,  159,  163. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  179,  “House  of  Commons  Journal,”  May  1,  1788. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  121 


of  the  chimney,  and  then  descend  slowly,  sweeping  the  soot 
down  as  he  went.  When  he  reached  the  bend  where  the 
flue  turned  at  right  angles,  he  would  find  great  masses  of 
soot  into  which  he  might  slide  as  into  a  death  trap.  If 
he  lost  his  head  and  got  jammed,  his  fate  was  sealed,  unless 
his  cries  could  bring  help  in  time.  Opposition  to  the  use 
of  machines  came  chiefly  from  the  more  prosperous  master 
sweeps.”1 

Even  during  the  industrial  revolution  in  England  a  few 
employers  were  aware  of  the  injustice  of  the  system  and 
were  making  individual  efforts  for  better  things,  but  up  to 
1840  such  examples  were  unhappily  rare  and  standards 
were  usually  set  by  the  worst  instead  of  the  best  employers. 
Members  of  Parliament  conscientiously  objected  to  educa¬ 
tion  for  the  laboring  classes  as  “prejudicial  to  their  morals 
and  happiness”! 

Even  in  the  face  of  all  these  crying  wrongs,  the  Com¬ 
bination  Laws  of  1799  and  1800  prevented  Trade  Union  or¬ 
ganizations  from  making  any  effort  to  raise  wages  or  im¬ 
prove  the  condition  of  the  workers.  Any  such  effort  was 
considered  conspiracy  and  treason  against  the  sacred  rights 
of  property.  At  Peterloo,  on  the  outskirts  of  Manchester, 
a  large  gathering  had  assembled  to  demand  universal  suf¬ 
frage,  vote  by  ballot,  and  the  repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws. 
The  crowd  was  charged  by  the  soldiers  who  killed  eleven 
and  wounded  over  four  hundred,  a  hundred  and  thirteen 
of  them  being  defenceless  women.  “The  scene  at  Peterloo 
illustrates  very  vividly  all  the  conditions  of  the  time.  The 
working  people  who  met  there  were  excluded  from  the 
rights  of  citizens:  they  were  refused  representation,  edu¬ 
cation,  liberty  to  combine  in  answer  to  the  combinations  of 
their  masters.  The  law  existed  solely  for  their  repression 


i  Hammond,  “The  Town  Labourer,”  p.  185. 


122 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


and  punishment.  They  were  nowhere  recognized  as  be¬ 
longing  to  society,  except  in  the  sense  in  which  his  wheels 
and  engines  belonged  to  the  owner  of  a  mill.”1  Magis¬ 
trates  and  yeomanry  cared  “little  for  the  lives  of  a  sub¬ 
jected  class.  .  .  .  The  Cheshire  magistrates  in  1819 

wanted  to  suppress  the  Sunday-schools.  The  spirit  of  the 
times  was  embodied  in  the  common  expression  ‘policing  the 
poor/  ” 

As  late  as  1860  Broughton  Charlton,  the  county  magis¬ 
trate  of  Nottingham,  declared  that  “Children  of  nine  or 
ten  years  are  dragged  from  the  squalid  beds  at  two,  three, 
or  four  o’clock  in  the  morning  and  compelled  to  work  for 
a  bare  subsistence  until  ten,  eleven,  or  twelve  at  night, 
their  limbs  wearing  away,  their  frames  dwindling,  their 
faces  whitening,  and  their  humanity  absolutely  sinking 
into  a  stone-like  torpor,  utterly  horrible  to  contemplate.”2 

During  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  a  new 
social  conscience  was  awakened.  The  reign  of  Queen  Vic¬ 
toria  alone  witnessed  a  vast  reform  movement,  the  exten¬ 
sion  of  democratic  government  and  the  franchise  to  work¬ 
ers,  the  spread  of  education,  the  improvement  in  the  con¬ 
dition  of  the  poor,  and  especially  the  recognition  of  the 
right  of  labor  to  organize  in  order  to  win  its  way  to  a 
decent  human  life.  We  gain  a  picture  of  early  Victorian 
conditions  in  the  Life  of  Lord  Shaftesbury:  “The  mill 
children  deformed  in  spine  and  knee  and  stupefied  with 
weariness,  the  infant  mine  ‘trappers’  quaking  from  the 
blackness  and  solitude  of  the  rat-ridden  pits,  the  all  but 
naked  women  harnessed  to  the  coal  carts,  the  cancerous 
chimney-climbing  boys,  their  raw  knees  and  elbows  steeped 
in  brine,  the  lunatic  women  crawling,  bearded  and  ragged, 
in  the  filth  of  uncontrolled  asylums,  the  whole  defile  of 


1  “The  Town  Labourer,”  pp.  91-93. 

2  Bertrand  Russell,  “  Proposed  Roads  to  Freedom,”  pp.  19,  20. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  123 


spectres  from  the  lower  of  the  ‘Two  Nations’  into  which 
industrialism  had  divided  England.”1  The  contrast  be¬ 
tween  the  beginning  and  end  of  the  reign  can  be  realized  by 
the  summary  of  Dean  Farrar:  “When  the  reign  began,  lit¬ 
tle  paupers  were  beaten  and  starved;  naval  apprentices  in 
coal-boats  and  merchant  vessels  were  subject  to  horrible 
barbarities;  the  poor  little  climbing  boys,  grimed  with  soot 
and  skin  diseases,  were  maimed  and  suffocated  in  choked 
and  crooked  chimneys;  children  were  worked  in  cotton 
mills  for  unbroken  hours  which  would  have  been  crushing 
to  grown  men.  They  were  brutally  treated  in  brick  fields, 
in  canal  boats,  in  agriculture  gangs,  in  pantomimes,  in  dan¬ 
gerous  performances,  in  the  hands  of  beggars  and  hawkers 
and  acrobats.  Waifs  and  strays,  criminal  and  semi-crimi¬ 
nal,  unwashed,  untaught,  unfed,  weltered  in  an  atmosphere 
of  blasphemy  and  gin,  in  lairs  and  dens  of  human  wild 
beasts,  such  as  are  now  swept  away  by  the  merciful  hand 
of  law.”2 

On  the  one  hand  these  changes  were  wrought  chiefly  by 
the  steady  evolutionary  and  educational  advances  of  or¬ 
ganized  labor  as  it  won  the  legal  right  of  collective  bar¬ 
gaining.  On  the  other  hand,  by  the  co-operation  of  the 
liberals,  enlightened  employers  like  Robert  Owen,  and 
great  philanthropists  like  Lord  Shaftesbury,  a  body  of  new 
legislation  was  secured  in  the  Factory  Acts  and  Acts  con¬ 
cerning  Education,  Workmen’s  Compensation,  Old  Age 
Pension,  National  Insurance,  Public  Health,  Housing,  etc.3 

Out  of  their  hardships  and  handicaps  the  workers  evolved 
the  trade  union  as  a  means  of  raising  their  standard  of 

1  “Life  of  Lord  Shaftesbury,”  by  J.  L.  and  Barbara  Hammond. 

2  “A  History  of  Labour,”  p.  249. 

*  Mr.  Gilbert  Stone  in  “  A  History  of  Labour,”  p.  287,  lists  sixty-six  principal  Factory, 
Workshop  and  Mining  Acts  passed  between  1800  and  the  present  time  in  England  alone. 
Several  of  these  acts  have  done  more  than  all  previous  centuries  to  change  the  conditions 
of  the  poor  in  industry. 


124 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


life.  Strikes  are  older  than  recorded  history,  going  back 
for  more  than  thirty  centuries  to  the  revolt  of  the  Hebrew 
brick  makers  of  Egypt  under  their  autocratic  employer 
Pharoah,  and  doubtless  before  that  time.  The  earliest 
permanent  combination  of  workers  in  England  precedes 
the  factory  system  by  a  century,  and  even  as  early  as  1383 
we  find  “conspiracies  of  workmen”  to  better  their  condition 
prohibited. 

From  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth 
century  the  state  had  recognized  its  responsibility  for 
regulating  industry  in  the  interests  of  a  certain  standard  of 
living  for  the  workers.  By  the  close  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  however,  state  control  had  given  way  to  individual 
bargaining  and  the  helpless  workers  were  left  unprotected 
at  the  mercy  of  the  employers. 

The  publication  of  Adam  Smith’s  epoch  making  Wealth 
of  Nations  in  1776,  while  it  displayed  trade  as  a  life  of 
mutual  service,  furnished  the  employing  and  governing 
class  with  its  political  philosophy  of  freedom  of  contract 
and  “natural  liberty”  as  a  justification  for  their  huge 
profits.1 

Finding  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  that  the  mis¬ 
erable  state  of  the  workers  was  driving  them  to  organize, 
and  fearing  the  result  of  such  organization,  the  government 
of  the  day  rushed  through  the  House  of  Commons  in  1799 
and  1800  two  Acts,  known  as  the  Combination  Laws,  pro¬ 
hibiting  in  drastic  manner  any  union  of  workmen  designed 

1  He  contended  that  “  the  obvious  and  simple  system  of  natural  liberty  establishes 
itself  of  its  own  accord.  Every  man,  as  long  as  he  does  not  violate  the  laws  of  justice 
is  left  perfectly  free  to  pursue  his  own  interests  in  his  own  way,  and  to  bring  both  his 
industry  and  capital  into  competition  with  those  of  any  other  man  or  order  of  men.” 
He  says  further  that  “Civil  government,  so  far  as  it  is  instituted  for  the  security  of 
property,  is,  in  reality,  instituted  for  the  defence  of  the  rich  against  the  poor,  or  of  those 
who  have  some  property  against  those  who  have  none  at  all.  .  .  .  The  upper  classes 
allowed  no  values  to  the  workpeople  but  those  which  the  slaveowner  appreciates  in 
the  slave.”  Wealth  of  Nations,  Book  IV,  Chapter  IX;  and  Book  V,  Chapter  I. 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  125 


for  the  common  protection  of  their  wages  or  conditions 
of  work. 

Until  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  worker  had 
been  afforded  some  protection  by  the  law,  but  in  1814  the 
last  remnant  of  that  legislative  code  disappeared  and  the 
individual  worker,  dependent  upon  his  weekly  wage,  was 
left  in  unrestricted  freedom  to  make  such  bargain  as  he 
could  with  an  employer  who  had  behind  him  much  greater 
capital  resources  than  had  ever  been  known  prior  to  the 
industrial  revolution.  Thus  was  the  policy  of  laissez-faire 
ruthlessly  followed.  Statutory  protection  was  taken  from 
the  worker  while  he  was  forbidden  to  protect  himself. 

The  hardship  and  injustice  of  the  Combination  Laws, 
however,  attracted  the  attention  of  a  small  but  influential 
group  of  radicals,  led  by  Francis  Place  and  Joseph  Hume. 
Place,  a  tailor  of  Charing  Cross,  worked  most  assiduously 
for  the  repeal  of  the  laws  and  was  the  inspirer  of  Hume, 
who  fought  the  case  through  the  House  of  Commons.  After 
a  Committee  of  Enquiry,  which  had  reported  that  the  Com¬ 
bination  Laws  had  given  a  “violent  character”  to  workmen’s 
societies,  an  act  of  repeal  passed  through  Parliament  in 
1824  and  was  modified  by  a  further  act  in  1825. 

These  acts  were  immediately  followed  by  much  trade 
union  activity  and  associations  were  formed  all  through 
the  country.  A  number  of  strikes  occurred  but  met  with 
uniform  failure.  Small  unions  and  sectional  strikes  having 
failed,  the  workers  next  turned  to  the  “one  big  union” 
idea.  It  was  at  this  time  that  Robert  Owen,  an  employer 
with  high  ideals,  was  preaching  co-operative  production 
and  advocating  the  one  big  union.  The  mill  which  he  suc¬ 
cessfully  worked  at  Lanark  was  undoubtedly  a  model  for 
other  employers  of  the  time. 

In  1834  he  succeeded  in  forming  the  Grand  National 
Consolidated  Trades  Union,  and  immediately  thousands  of 


126 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


workers  all  over  the  country  flocked  to  join  its  ranks.  But 
the  time  was  not  yet  ripe  for  a  venture  of  this  type,  and 
after  the  transportation  of  six  Dorchester  laborers  for 
merely  administering  an  oath  of  admittance  to  a  lodge  of 
the  Union,  the  Grand  National  quickly  collapsed. 

After  this  third  setback  trade  unionism  lay  dormant  for 
the  whole  of  the  next  decade.  In  the  meantime,  however, 
the  workers  again  turned  their  thoughts  to  the  political 

sphere  and  in  1838  the  Chartist  Movement  was  at  its 

»•** 

height.  Pessimistic  regarding  their  powTers  in  the  industrial 
sphere,  disappointed  wfith  the  Reform  Act  of  1832,  which 
had  enfranchised  the  middle  class  but  left  the  workers 
voteless,  and  goaded  by  the  new  Poor  Law  of  1834,  a  cam¬ 
paign  was  launched  and  a  program  of  reform  proposed. 
This  program,  known  as  the  “People’s  Charter,”  demanded 
adult  suffrage,  annual  Parliaments,  the  abolition  of  the 
property  qualification  for  members,  equal  electoral  dis¬ 
tricts,  vote  by  ballot  and  payment  of  members.  Alive  as 
this  movement  undoubtedly  was,  it  achieved  no  immediate 
success.  In  spite  of  its  apparent  failure,  however,  before 
the  end  of  the  century  the  most  important  points  of  the 
Chartist  program  became  law. 

After  the  failure  of  the  political  Chartist  Movement,  the 
pendulum  swung  again  toward  industrial  trade  union  activ¬ 
ity,  which  began  to  revive  about  1845.  Most  of  the  unions 
collected  and  administered  extensive  friendly  benefits,  and 
in  this  policy  of  combining  benefits  with  the  trade  club 
lay  the  security  and  stability  of  the  new  unions,  which 
attracted  a  steady  and  comparatively  prosperous  class  of 
artisans.  This  was  the  real  beginning  of  the  modern  trade 
union  movement  and  from  this  time  forward  trade  union¬ 
ism  steadily  grew  towards  its  present-day  position.  The 
dock  strike  of  1889  gave  a  great  impetus  to  the  organization 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  127 


of  the  general  laborer,  who  is  now  catered  for  by  unions  as 
large  and  as  important  as  those  of  the  skilled  artisan. 

Although  a  combination  of  workmen  was  not,  as  such, 
any  longer  illegal,  it  was  not  recognized  at  law  and  nu¬ 
merous  acts  which,  if  done  by  an  individual  were  legal, 
were,  if  committed  by  a  combination,  illegal.  The  conse¬ 
quence  of  this  position  were  first  felt  seriously  as  a  result 
of  the  Taff  Vale  judgment.  In  this  case  the  Amalgamated 
Society  of  Railway  Servants  was  on  strike  in  South  Wales 
when  the  Union  was  sued  for  damages  as  the  result  of  the 
action  of  one  of  its  members.  The  case  was  fought  through 
to  the  House  of  Lords,  which  decided  against  the  Union. 
This  was  for  the  time  being  a  serious  setback,  and  through 
the  decision  and  the  disputes  that  followed  the  trade  unions 
lost  nearly  a  million  dollars.  Employers  took  every  oppor¬ 
tunity  to  break  the  unions,  which,  however,  doubled  their 
membership  during  the  following  year.  At  the  election  of 
1906,  29  labor  members  were  returned  to  the  House  of  Com¬ 
mons  and  the  Trade  Disputes  Act,  which  still  remains  the 
“main  charter  of  trade  unionism,”  was  passed  to  remedy 
the  position  brought  about  by  the  judgment  in  the  Taff 
Vale  case. 

The  next  important  event  in  the  legal  history  of  trade 
unions  occurred  in  1911,  when  by  the  Osborne  judgment 
the  House  of  Lords  held  that  trade  unions  were  not  entitled 
to  incur  expenditure  in  political  activities.  This  decision 
was  of  the  gravest  consequence  to  the  Britsh  Labor  Move¬ 
ment,  which  very  largely  relied  on  the  unions  for  its  funds. 
After  keen  agitation  an  Act  was  passed  in  1913  allowing 
unions  to  include  in  their  constitution  any  lawful  purpose 
whatever,  including  the  making  of  a  political  levy,  from 
which,  however,  objectors  were  given  statutory  exemption. 
Trade  unions  then  became  a  lawful  and  loyal  part  of  the 


128 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


corporate  life  of  Great  Britain  and  today  have  a  member¬ 
ship  of  between  four  and  five  million. 

We  have  so  far  very  briefly  noted  the  growth  of  the  trade 
union  movement,  its  fight  for  existence  and  then  for  recog¬ 
nition  during  the  nineteenth  century.  While  the  workers 
were  thus  employed  the  state  itself  was,  by  the  sheer 
brutality  of  existing  conditions,  compelled  to  take  some 
action  on  its  own  account  for  the  protection  of  the  most 
defenceless  of  the  workers. 

Before  the  end  of  the  second  decade  of  the  nineteenth 
century  the  policy  of  laissez-faire  had  already  outrun  itself, 
and  in  1819  the  state  was  compelled  to  step  in  and  forbid 
the  employment  of  children  under  16  for  more  than  12 
hours  a  day,  exclusive  of  meal  times.  The  Factory  Act 
of  1833  prohibited  night  work  by  persons  under  18  years 
of  age  and  also  raised  the  age  limit  for  the  12  hour  day  to 
18  years.  Under  this  act  factory  inspectors  were  first 
appointed.  From  this  time  on,  as  the  result  of  the  agita¬ 
tion  of  Richard  Oastler  and  the  philanthropic  policy  of 
Lord  Shaftesbury,  an  increasing  number  of  Acts  were 
passed  relating  to  conditions  and  hours  in  factories  and 
workshops.  The  conditions  prevailing  prior  to  and  during 
this  period  of  factory  legislation  are  almost  unbelievable. 

There  has  been  a  long  fight,  lasting  for  centuries  from 
the  days  of  slavery  and  serfdom,  through  poverty  and  op¬ 
pression,  through  the  agrarian  and  industrial  revolutions 
up  to  the  recognized  status  of  the  Trades  Union  Movement, 
now  represented  by  a  Labor  Party,  which  is  His  Majesty's 
Opposition,  and  will  soon  probably  be  the  Government  of 
Britain.  There  has  been  a  slow  but  sure  evolution  of  labor 
in  England.  And  England  is  typical  in  many  respects  of 
the  movement  on  the  continent  of  Europe.  Mankind  is 
still  on  the  march.  Socially  he  has  slowly  progressed  from 


THE  EVOLUTION  OF  LABOR  IN  THE  WEST  129 


status  to  contract,  politically  from  despotism  to  democracy, 
industrially  from  slavery  to  freedom. 

The  long  struggle  has  been  between  the  property  rights 
of  the  selfish  special  privilege  of  a  favored  few,  and  the  -  v 
personal  rights  of  the  dispossessed  many.  But  property  ; 
rights  and  the  power  of  wealth  have  always  given  political, 
social  and  industrial  power  over  the  lives  of  others.  From 
the  days  of  Rome  to  modern  England  and  America,  most 
of  the  laws  have  been  framed  for  the  protection  of  property  *  * 
rather  than  personality.  A  review  of  the  gradual  evolution 
of  labor  in  Europe  should  fill  us  with  sympathy  for  the 
workers  in  Asia  who  are  suffering  today  from  the  same  low 
wages,  long  hours  and  bad  working  conditions  that  pre¬ 
vailed  in  the  West  a  century  ago.  It  should  fill  us  with 
hope  for  the  future  in  East  and  West  alike.  It  should 
nerve  us  with  the  resolve  that  we  shall  not  rest  while 
poverty,  want  and  oppression  exist,  anywhere  in  the  world, 
side  by  side  with  exorbitant  wealth,  luxury  and  privilege 
unshared. 


Chapter  VI 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

The  Labor  Movement  in  Great  Britain  was  the  child  of 
the  industrial  revolution.  It  represented  the  effort  of  the 
workers  to  protect  themselves  against  the  encroachment 
of  the  machine  upon  human  life,  to  win  for  the  present 
better  conditions  in  industry,  and  for  the  future  a  new  social 
order.  The  logic  of  fact  drove  the  workers  to  organize  in 
sheer  self-protection  against  the  inhuman  conditions  which 
we  have  described  in  the  last  chapter. 

Colonel  Perronet  Thompson  describes  the  condition  of 
the  Lancashire  cotton  workers  during  the  first  half  of  the 
nineteenth  century  in  “the  squalid  misery,  the  slow,  moul¬ 
dering,  putrefying  death  by  which  the  weak  and  feeble  of 
the  working  classes  are  perishing.”1  The  doctrine  of  laissez- 
faire  had  left  every  man  for  himself  and  the  devil  to  take 
the  hindmost. 

Following  the  industrial  revolution  the  merciless  com¬ 
petition  of  an  individualist  society  gradually  gave  place  to 
the  more  co-operative  life  of  the  collective  community.  In 
all  departments  men  began  to  unite  and  organize  for  a  bet¬ 
ter  life.  One  function  after  another  that  had  once  been 
left  to  individual  direction  or  private  profit  was  taken  over 
by  the  community.  Paving,  lighting  and  street  cleaning; 
protection  against  violence,  robbery,  fire  or  flood;  the  pub¬ 
lic  supply  and  distribution  of  man’s  great  common  needs 
of  water,  gas  and  electric  power,  and  even  in  some  cases  of 

i  Cambridge  Modern  History,  Vol.  XII,  p.  730. 

130 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


131 


milk  and  other  food ;  the  means  of  transportation  and  com¬ 
munication,  posts  and  telegraph;  the  public  care  of  the 
sick,  the  aged,  the  infirm,  of  widows  and  orphans,  cripples 
and  defectives;  the  protection  of  childhood  and  maternity, 
education  for  children  and  adults;  the  provision  of  libra¬ 
ries,  museums,  galleries,  parks  and  playgrounds  for  the 
people;  co-operation  in  agriculture  and  industry;  the  pro¬ 
vision  of  labor  exchanges  for  unemployment,  the  settlement 
of  industrial  disputes  and  the  administration  of  justice, 
civil  and  industrial — these  and  a  score  of  other  activities 
and  functions  have  been  in  various  degrees  taken  over  by 
the  community  in  collective  or  co-operative  organization.1 
Consciously  or  unconsciously,  in  theory  or  practice,  men 
began  to  learn  that  the  ultimate  law  of  social  life  is  not 
competition,  but  co-operation  and  association.  Men  were 
driven  inevitably  to  organize  in  all  departments  of  life, 
political,  religious,  social  and  industrial.  As  the  neediest 
section  of  the  community  it  behooved  labor  to  organize 
also. 

The  British  Labor  Movement  developed  along  four 
parallel  lines:  (1)  The  Trade  Union  Movement,  as  an  or¬ 
ganization  of  producers  to  protect  or  raise  the  standard  of 
their  industrial  life;  (2)  The  Co-operative  Movement,  as  an 
organization  chiefly  of  consumers  to  safeguard  the  working 
class  against  high  prices  and  profiteering,  and  to  improve 
their  material  conditions;  (3)  The  Labor  Party,  as  the  po¬ 
litical  organization  of  the  workers  by  hand  or  brain,  to 
obtain  by  legislation  and  constitutional  means  a  better  life 
for  all  classes  alike;  and  (4)  The  Workers’  Educational 
Movement  to  train  themselves  for  democracy  and  for  full 
citizenship  in  a  new  social  order. 

1.  The  first  of  these,  the  Trade  Union  Movement,  as  we 


1  Cambridge  Modern  History,  Vol.  XII,  p.  735. 


132 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


have  already  seen,  developed  in  England  in  the  eighteenth 
century  in  self-protection  against  the  ominous  advance  of 
the  industrial  revolution. 

The  last  decade  has  witnessed  a  remarkable  growth  of 
the  Trade  Union  Movement  in  Britain.  In  1910  the  num¬ 
ber  in  organized  unions  was  2,435,704;  at  the  close  of  the 
war  in  1919,  it  was  8,023,761.1  A  trade  union  had  been 
defined  as  “a  continuous  association  of  wage  earners  for 
the  purpose  of  maintaining  or  improving  the  conditions  of 
their  working  lives.”  As  the  name  implies,  they  were  first 
organized  for  a  simple  trade,  or  “craft,”  often  uniting  only 
workers  employed  in  a  single  occupation.  The  same  neces¬ 
sity  for  protection  which  drove  certain  individual  workers 
to  unite  in  a  craft  union,  finally  drove  other  workers  to 
combine  in  more  comprehensive  “industrial”  unions,  uniting 
all  the  workers  engaged  in  a  single  industry.  The  move¬ 
ment  toward  combination  was  further  developed  by  the 
enlarging  aims  of  labor  toward  the  “democratic  control  of 
industry”  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  political  control  of  the 
government  on  the  other.  There  is  at  the  present  time  a 
steady  development  in  amalgamation  and  solidification  in 
the  Trade  Union  Movement  of  Great  Britain. 

Running  horizontally  across  industry  are  the  craft 
unions,  vertically  within  particular  industries  are  the  in¬ 
dustrial  unions.  The  Miners'  Federation,  the  National 
Union  of  Railwaymen  and  the  Iron  and  Steel  Trades  Con¬ 
federation  are  examples  of  industrial  unions.  There  is 

1  Growth  of  the  Trade  Union  Movement: 

Trade  Unions  Membership 


1868 .  34  118,368 

1900 .  1.302  1,971,923 

1914 .  1,123  3,918,809 

1919 .  1.315  8,023,761 


The  figures  for  1868  represent  only  those  represented  at  the  first  Trade  Union  Congress. 
Labor  International  Handbook,  1921,  p.  256. 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


133 


likely  to  be  a  pitched  battle  between  these  two  types  of 
unions,  but  the  present  tendency  is  toward  the  development 
of  the  greater  strength  and  unity  of  the  industrial  union. 
The  Triple  Industrial  Alliance,  formed  in  1915  of  all  or¬ 
ganized  miners,  railwaymen  and  transport  workers,  showed 
a  tendency  of  unions  representing  related  industries  to  form 
still  larger  combinations. 

Practically  all  of  the  unions  are  combined  in  the  annual 
Trade  Union  Congress,  which  seeks  to  enable  the  whole 
movement  to  function  as  a  unit  for  industrial  action,  and 
to  promote  legislation.1  At  Portsmouth  in  1920  the  writer 
was  struck  with  the  contrast  between  two  epochs  as  he 
passed  from  the  deck  of  Nelson’s  old  flagship,  the  Victory, 
to  the  platform  of  the  Trade  Union  Congress.  The  one 
represented  the  imperialism,  militarism  and  conquest  on 
land  and  sea  of  an  old  order  that  is  doomed  to  perish.  The 
Congress  in  its  resolution  for  peace,  constitutionalism  and 
democracy  in  industry  and  government,  universal  educa¬ 
tion,  self-determination  for  all  mature  peoples  and  world 
brotherhood,  stood  for  the  new  social  order  that  must  be 
built  in  the  future  if  civilization  is  to  be  saved. 

The  Trade  Union  Act  of  1913  enabled  the  unions  to  take 
a  direct  part  in  politics.  The  action  of  the  government 
gave  them  increased  prestige  during  the  war  and  both  gov~ 
ernment  and  large  employers  found  it  to  their  advantage 
to  negotiate  with  organized  labor  that  could  keep  its  con¬ 
tracts  rather  than  with  masses  of  discontented,  unorgan¬ 
ized  workers  in  a  continual  ferment  of  strikes. 

There  are  today  over  a  thousand  trade  unions  in  Britain 
with  memberships  running  from  a  score  to  several  hundred 

1  It  affiliates  all  important  trade  unions  of  manual  workers  and  a  few  brain  workers. 
First  organized  in  1868  with  thirty-four  delegates  representing  118,367  workers,  by 
1920  it  had  955  delegates  representing  6,505,482  workers.  In  the  years  following  it 
suffered  a  heavy  decline  during  the  period  of  unemployment  and  financial  depression. 


134 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


thousand,  varying  in  method  of  organization  from  a  small 
craft  to  a  large  industrial  union  enrolling  everyone  skilled 
and  unskilled  of  “all  grades”  in  an  industry.  After  the 
war,  in  1920,  the  Miners’  Federation  numbered  some 
900,000.  The  National  Union  of  Railwaymen,  seeking  to 
unite  all  the  workers  in  a  single  industry  on  a  twentieth 
century  “new  model,”  reported  481,000;  the  Engineering 
Union  453,603,  and  the  Agricultural  Laborers’  Union  over 
200,000  in  the  same  year. 

During  the  present  trade  depression  with  some  two  mil¬ 
lions  unemployed  the  trade  unions  are  passing  through  a 
difficult  period.  Their  membership  fell  from  over  eight  to 
less  than  five  millions  by  the  end  of  1923.  Labor  through¬ 
out  the  continent  of  Europe  must  face  a  period  of  depres¬ 
sion  for  several  years  owing  to  disturbed  political  and  eco¬ 
nomic  conditions,  the  opposition  of  employers  and  govern¬ 
ments,  and  the  division  in  its  own  ranks  caused  by  Moscow. 

2.  The  Co-operative  Movement  in  Britain  seeks  to  or¬ 
ganize  the  workers  as  consumers,  as  the  trade  unions  seek 
to  protect  them  as  producers.  It  looks  back  to  Robert 
Owen,  the  first  great  factory  reformer,  as  its  founder,  in 
his  experiment  begun  in  1799.  He  endeavored  to  substitute 
co-operation  for  competition  and  industrial  democracy  for 
autocracy.  But  the  successful  type  of  a  consumers’  co¬ 
operative  society  was  started  at  Rochdale  in  1844.  Here 
twenty-eight  poor  flannel  weavers  saved  their  pennies  to 
collect  their  little  store  of  capital  of  one  pound  each,  or  a 
total  of  $140.00,  and  took  turns  tending  their  first  little 
shop.  They  were  unconsciously  beginning  one  of  the  great 
financial  and  social  movements  of  history.  Their  experi¬ 
ment  finally  improved  the  condition  of  millions  of  work¬ 
ing  men,  enabling  them  to  obtain  cheap  provisions,  to 
escape  from  penury  and  debt,  to  educate  themselves,  and 
to  extend  their  operations  from  distribution  to  manufac- 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT  135 

turing,  building,  banking,  insurance  and  wholesale  produc¬ 
tion.1 

Where  others  had  failed  The  Rochdale  Equitable 
Pioneers  succeeded  by  a  new  method  of  dealing  with  their 
profits  or  surplus  by  a  “dividend  on  purchases.”  After 
paying  interest  of  five  per  cent  or  less  on  their  share  cap¬ 
ital,  all  profit  was  divided  between  the  members  in  propor¬ 
tion  to  their  purchases.  This  profit  was  credited  to  each 
member  and  capitalized  until  his  share  amounted  to  five 
pounds.  This  plan  of  consumers’  co-operatives  owned  by 
the  purchasers  spread  rapidly  over  England,  and  later  over 
the  continent  of  Europe  and  the  rest  of  the  world. 

The  British  Co-operatives  now  own  their  own  wheat 
lands  in  Canada,  their  tea  estates  in  Ceylon,  their  own 
cotton  mills,  clothing  and  furniture  factories,  fishing  fleets, 
dairy  farms,  ships,  stores,  banks  and  insurance  companies.2 
They  have  their  own  libraries  and  educational  facilities. 
Beginning  with  twenty-eight  poor  weavers  less  than  eighty 
years  ago,  they  have  raised  the  standard  of  living  not  only 
for  their  4,598,737  members,  but  with  their  families  for 
over  sixteen  millions  of  people.  Thus  the  Co-operatives 
already  supply  more  than  a  third  of  the  people  of  Britain 
with  about  half  of  the  food  they  buy  and  a  third  of  their 
cloth  and  furniture.  They  employ  over  187,979  workers. 
Already  the  four  and  a  half  million  co-operators  in  Great 
Britain  possess  nearly  five  hundred  million  dollars  in  cap- 

1  See  “Co-operation  and  the  Future  of  Industry,”  by  Leonard  S.  Woolf.  The 
Consumers  Co-operative  Movement,  Sidney  and  Beatrice  Webb.  The  Story  of  the 
Co-operative  Wholesale  Society  1863—1913.  The  People’s  Year  Book,  1923,  issued 
annually. 

2  The  Co-operative  Movement  in  Britain  consists  chiefly  of  organizations  of  con¬ 
sumers  rather  than  of  producers.  After  the  war,  in  1921,  of  1,472  co-operatives,  1,352 
were  societies  of  oonsumers  and  only  102  of  producers.  The  membership  of  the  former 
was  4,548,557  and  their  trade  approximately  $1,000,000,000,  while  the  membership 
of  the  latter  was  but  38,360  and  their  trade  some  $30,000,000.  Peoples’  Year  Book, 
1923,  p.  17. 


136 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


ital,  in  addition  to  much  larger  sums  already  declared  in 
dividends  to  members.  They  do  an  annual  business  of  a 
billion  and  a  half  dollars,  or  nearly  as  much  as  the  United 
States  Steel  Corporation.  Directors  who  are  full-time 
salaried  officials  are  rendering  highly  efficient  service  at 
salaries  of  little  more  than  $2,500  a  year.  They  are  at 
least  as  efficient  as  members  of  competing  systems  who 
claim  that  men  will  not  do  good  work  except  for  high 
profits. 

According  to  the  Co-operative  Peoples’  Year  Book  for 
1923  there  are  already  some  32,000,000  co-operative  mem¬ 
bers  in  the  thirty  principal  countries  of  the  world,  repre¬ 
senting  with  their  families  nearly  150,000,000  people,  or 
nearly  one-tenth  of  the  entire  population  of  the  world. 
Thus  in  Russia  after  forty  years  of  struggle  against  opposi¬ 
tion  under  the  Czarist  regime,  the  1,000  societies  in  1905 
had  grown  in  1919  to  25,000  societies  claiming  a  member¬ 
ship  of  some  12,000,000.  Russia  and  several  other  coun¬ 
tries,  however,  suffered  a  temporary  decline  in  membership 
in  the  period  of  depression  which  followed  the  war. 

The  Co-operative  Movement  succeeded  because  it  dis¬ 
covered  a  great  law  of  life.  It  was  based  on  the  principle 
of  co-operation  instead  of  competition,  substituting  indus¬ 
trial  democracy  for  autocratic  control,  and  the  common 
welfare  of  all,  for  the  private  profit  of  the  few.  It  is  a 
movement  of,  by  and  for  the  working  people.  Its  motto  is 
“All  for  each  and  each  for  all.”  Its  aim  is  not  merely 
financial  profit  but  the  development  of  personality,  in 
building  a  community  of  free  men  based  upon  economic 
independence,  from  the  humble  beginning  of  a  common 
grocery  store.  The  simple  method  of  a  dividend  on  pur¬ 
chases,  instead  of  on  stock  or  share  capital,  secures  demo¬ 
cratic  ownership  and  control,  keeps  the  movement  always 
expanding,  with  the  door  ever  open  for  new  comers  upon 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


137 


a  basis  of  equal  opportunity,  and  avoids  the  danger  of  a 
monopolistic  trust,  or  an  exclusive  close  corporation.  All 
members  have  an  equal  vote  and  no  ownership  of  a  larger 
amount  of  share  capital  gives  any  additional  influence. 

Experience  points  toward  the  ever  widening  integration 
of  the  community,  organized  co-operatively  as  consumers 
and  citizens.  The  world  has  not  yet  begun  to  explore  the 
possibilities  of  co-operation. 

3.  The  Labor  Party  as  the  political  expression  of  the 
movement  seeks  to  unite  both  producers  and  consumers  in 
a  democratic  political  state,  based  upon  the  trade  unions 
which  seek  to  build  up  a  democracy  of  producers,  and  the 
co-operatives  as  a  community  chiefly  of  consumers. 

In  1892  Keir  Hardie,  of  the  Miners’  Federation,  was 
elected  to  the  House  of  Commons  as  the  first  independent 
labor  member.  The  following  year,  in  1893,  the  Independ¬ 
ent  Labor  Party  was  formed  and  the  present  Labor  Party 
in  1906.  The  remarkable  growth  of  the  party  is  shown  by 
the  number  of  candidates  elected  to  Parliament  and  the 
votes  polled  from  year  to  year.* 1  In  1900  Labor  elected  two 
members  to  the  House  of  Commons,  polling  a  total  vote  of 
62,698.  In  1922  it  polled  more  than  four  and  a  quarter 
million,  or  one-third  of  all  the  votes  cast  in  Great  Britain. 
Labor  now  has  144  seats  in  the  House  of  Commons  and 
is  officially  recognized  as  “His  Majesty’s  Opposition,”  being 
prepared  to  form  an  alternative  ministry  to  take  over  the 
government  whenever  called  upon.2  It  is  generally  con¬ 
ceded  that  labor  will  probably  be  the  government  of  Britain 

Candidates  elected  Total  labor  vote 


i  In  1900 .  2  62,698 

1910 .  40  505,690 

1918 .  57  3,013,129 

1922 .  142  4,236,733 


s  In  September,  1923,  the  615  seats  in  the  House  of  Commons  were  divided  as  follows: 
Conservatives  333,  Labor  144,  Liberals  61,  National  Liberals  56,  Communists  1, 
Others  20. 


138 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


within  a  few  years.  To  do  this  they  must  transform  their 
present  minority  of  one-third  to  a  majority  of  something 
like  two-thirds  of  the  national  votes. 

The  aims  of  Labor  are  both  practical  and  idealistic, 
seeking  the  best  possible  conditions  under  the  existing 
system,  and  ultimately  changing  the  industrial  system  by 
establishing  in  industry  and  society  such  democratic  con¬ 
ditions  and  relations  as  will  satisfy  the  legitimate  aspira¬ 
tions  of  the  workers  and  most  benefit  the  whole  of  society. 
The  aiims  of  the  Labor  Party  are  explicitly  stated  in  Labor 
and  the  New  Social  Order  in  its  four  pillars: 

1.  The  Universal  Enforcement  of  the  National  Minimum. 

2.  The  Democratic  Control  of  Industry. 

3.  Revolution  in  National  Finance. 

4.  Surplus  Wealth  for  the  Common  Good. 

By  a  National  Minimum  is  meant  the  securing  to  every 
member  of  the  community  all  the  requisites  of  healthy  life 
and  worthy  citizenship,  resisting  every  movement  for 
degradation  of  the  workers’  standard  of  life  by  forced 
unemployment,  sweated  labor,  etc. 

The  Labor  Party  aims  at  democracy  in  industry  as  well 
as  in  government,  looking  toward  democratic  control  of 
industry  through  the  direct  participation  of  trade  unions  in 
its  management.  It  advocates  more  personal  property 
rather  than  less,  but  it  stands  for  the  ultimate  nationaliza¬ 
tion  of  mines,  railways,  canals  and  of  the  production  of 
electricity  for  cheap  power,  light  and  heat.  The  national¬ 
ization  of  the  mines  was  advocated  by  the  Coal  Commission 
appointed  by  the  Lloyd  George  Government.  If  this  is 
tried  and  proves  successful,  the  nationalization  of  other 
services  may  be  attempted. 

The  Labor  Party  also  demands  a  revision  of  national 
finance.  The  national  debt  now  amounts  to  over  $36,000,- 
000,000.  To  meet  the  annual  interest  on  this  debt  consumes 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


139 


a  third  of  the  national  income.  Nearly  five  million  dollars 
have  to  be  taken  from  the  product  of  labor  each  working 
day  to  defray  the  interest  on  the  war  debt.  The  Labor 
Party  proposes  to  wipe  out  about  half  of  the  debt  by  a 
levy  on  capital  on  all  fortunes  over  $25,000,  ranging  from 
a  minimum  of  one  per  cent  to  over  fifty  per  cent  on  large 
fortunes,  in  order  to  secure  approximate  equality  of  sacri¬ 
fice  for  all  classes.  At  present  about  seventy-three  per 
cent  of  the  national  income  is  spent  for  war,  past  and 
future,  and  twenty-seven  per  cent  for  the  constructive 
work  <?f  peace.  Thus  labor  or  any  liberal  party  will  be 
crippled  for  lack  of  finances  for  any  constructive  policy 
for  education  or  social  insurance. 

At  present  13,992  persons  in  England  each  have  an  in¬ 
come  of  from  $450,000  to  over  $5,000,000  a  year,  while  two 
and  a  half  per  cent  of  the  population  own  eighty-eight- 
per  cent  of  the  wealth  of  the  country.  Eighty-eight  per 
cent  of  the  population,  or  forty  million  people,  own  but 
twelve  per  cent  of  the  wealth,  and  are  below  the  income  tax 
level  of  those  having  an  income  of  $650.00  a  year.1  Charles 
Booth  showed  that  32  per  cent  of  the  people  of  London 
were  living  in  chronic  poverty.  It  is  to  be  wondered  at 
that  four  and  a  half  million  voters  at  the  last  election  asked 
for  a  thorough  reconstruction  of  the  national  finance? 

The  Labor  Party  proposes  to  use  the  surplus  above  the 
standard  of  life  to  secure  industrial  efficiency  and  a  decent 
social  order.  It  desires  to  use  this  surplus  not  to  increase 
a  few  swollen  fortunes  for  a  leisure  class  aristocracy,  but  to 
educate  and  build  up  the  community  as  a  whole.  The 
Labor  Party  repudiates  the  policy  of  using  this  surplus 
wealth  to  build  up  an  imperialistic  army  and  navy  for  the 
conquest  and  subjugation  of  other  races  and  the  exploita¬ 
tion  of  their  raw  materials.  They  have  the  fullest  respect 


1  Labor  Speakers’  Handbook,  pp.  9-11,  based  on  Government  returns. 


140 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


for  local  autonomy,  self-determination  and  “Home  rule 
all  round,”  not  for  Ireland  only,  but  for  India  ,  Egypt, 
Mesopotamia  and  all  dominions.1 

The  British  Labor  Party  stands  for  the  spiritual  ideal 
of  a  new  social  order.  It  proposes  to  attain  this  by  a 
gradual  constructive  process  of  evolution,  not  by  sudden 
violent  revolution.  It  repudiates  the  dictatorship  of  any 
minority  or  class,  whether  of  aristocracy,  plutocracy  or 
proletariat;  whether  of  communist  radicalism  on  the  one 
hand,  or  of  fascisti  reaction  on  the  other.  By  an  over¬ 
whelming  majority  of  2,514,000,  with  only  366,000  oppos¬ 
ing  votes,  the  Labor  Party  refused  affiliation  with  the 
Communist  Party  because  of  their  rejection  of  the  consti¬ 
tution  of  the  Labor  Party  in  “the  political,  social  and  eco¬ 
nomic  emancipation  of  the  people  by  means  of  Parliamen¬ 
tary  Democracy.”2 

British  labor  stands  for  a  scheme  of  change  of  “inevitable 
gradualness  .  .  .  rooted  in  political  democracy.  .  .  .  Every 
step  toward  our  goal  is  dependent  on  gaining  the  assent 
and  support  of  at  least  a  numerical  majority  of  the  whole 
people.  .  .  .  Violence  persuades  no  one,  convinces  no  one, 
satisfies  no  one.”3  They  recall  that  their  founder  was  “not 

1  These  statements  of  policy  are  taken  from  Labor  and  the  New  Social  Order, 
pp.  5-22,  and  other  official  pronouncements  of  the  Labor  Party  in  its  Annual  Con¬ 
ferences.  Among  the  principal  resolutions  passed  by  the  annual  conference  of  the 
Labor  Party  from  1918  to  the  present  are: 

1.  Improvement  and  protection  of  workers’  standard  of  life. 

2.  Unemployment  insurance,  operating  where  possible  through  Trade  Unions. 

3.  Complete  emancipation  of  women,  industrially  and  politically. 

4.  Reform  of  the  franchise  and  abolition  of  the  present  Second  Chamber,  or  House 

of  Lords. 

5.  Improved  relations  with  the  Dominions  and  India. 

6.  Temperance  reform. 

7.  Nationalization  of  railways  and  canals,  supply  of  electricity,  coal  and  iron  mines, 

and  life  insurance. 

8.  Representative  government  in  industry. 

9.  Capital  levy  on  all  fortunes  above  £5,000  and  graduated  income  tax. 

2  Report  of  Annual  Conference  of  Labor  Party,  London,  1923,  p.  189, 

•Presidential  Address,  Labor  Party  Conference,  1923,  pp.  11,  12. 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


141 


Karl  Marx  but  Robert  Owen,  and  that  Robert  Owen 
preached  no  ‘class  war’  but  the  ancient  doctrine  of  human 
brotherhood  .  .  .  reaffirmed  in  the  words  of  William  Mor¬ 
ris,  ‘forsooth,  brothers,  fellowship  is  heaven,  and  lack  of 
fellowship  is  hell;  fellowship  is  life,  and  lack  of  fellowship 
is  death;  and  the  deeds  that  ye  do  upon  the  earth,  it  is  for 
fellowship’s  sake  that  ye  do  them;  and  the  life  that  is  in 
it,  that  shall  live  on  and  on  for  ever.’ 5,1 

4.  The  aim  of  workers’  education  in  England  is  to  unite 
scholarship  and  labor,  the  universities  and  the  trade  unions, 
the  intellectuals  and  manual  workers,  in  one  broadening 
movement  of  education  for  democracy.  Two  decades  ago 
the  universities  of  England  were  for  the  most  part  select 
and  exclusive  institutions  for  the  privileged  class.  With 
the  previous  rise  of  the  middle  class  the  universities  had 
widened  their  scope,  and  now  with  the  rise  of  the  laboring 
classes  they  are  magnificently  responding  to  the  larger  ideal 
of  “an  educated  nation.” 

Among  the  principal  existing  agencies  for  workers’  educa¬ 
tion  are  the  Workers’  Educational  Association,  the  educa¬ 
tion  work  of  the  Co-operative  Movement  and  the  two  resi¬ 
dential  institutions  of  Ruskin  College,  Oxford,  and  the 
Labor  College,  London,  with  their  extension  work  in  classes 
and  summer  schools.1 2 

Labor  leaders  for  a  century  had  advocated  adult  educa¬ 
tion,  but  the  control  of  this  movement  by  the  workers 
themselves  is  of  recent  origin.  Under  the  leadership  of  Mr. 

1  Presidential  Address,  Labor  Party  Conference,  1923,  p.  15. 

2  A  conference  of  national  trade  unions  in  October,  1920,  resulted  in  the  appointment, 
of  a  Workers’  Educational  Trade  Union  Committee  to  develop  education  among  organ¬ 
ized  workers  under  their  own  control.  It  operates  in  connection  with  the  Iron  and 
Steel  Trades  Confederation  and  the  strong  unions  to  give  effect  to  the  decision  of  the 
Trade  Union  Congress  to  coordinate  as  far  as  possible  the  various  educational  activities 
on  behalf  of  trade  unionists.  It  works  in  connection  with  Ruskin  College,  Oxford,  the 
Labor  College  and  Plebs  League,  the  Scottish  Labor  College,  the  Workers’  Educational 
Association  in  its  short  full-time  courses,  summer  schools  for  workers,  week-end  schools, 
tutorial  three  and  one  year  classes,  study  circles  and  courses  of  lectures. 


142 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


Albert  Mansbridge  who  sought  to  draw  the  universities  and 
the  workers  together,  the  Workers'  Educational  Association 
was  organized  in  1903  and  Mr.  R.  H.  Tawney  of  Oxford 
was  asked  to  take  the  first  University  Tutorial  class  at 
Rochdale  in  1906.1  A  report  on  Oxford  and  Working  Class 
Education  led  to  the  awakening  of  the  universities  to  the 
realization  of  their  responsibility  to  the  working  classes. 
Soon  “there  was  not  a  university  nor  a  university  college 
in  England  and  Wales  which  had  not  established  classes." 

The  W.  E.  A.  is  a  federation  of  working  class  and  educa¬ 
tional  institutions  and  organizations,  and  individual  mem¬ 
bers,  organized  in  279  branches,  13  districts,  3  federations, 
and,  finally,  in  a  national  association.  For  the  year  ending 
May  31,  1920,  it  had  enrolled  12,438  students  in  classes, 
357  in  residential  summer  schools,  and  over  1,000  in  study 
circles.  These  students  are  working  men  and  women.  The 
function  of  a  branch  council  is  to  organize  three-year  uni¬ 
versity  tutorial  classes,  one-year  classes,  study  circles, 
single  lectures  and  courses  of  lectures. 

The  W.  E.  A.  declares  itself  to  be  an  educational  expres¬ 
sion  of  the  working  class  movement,  and  stands  for  the 
principle  of  working  class  control  in  adult  education.  It 
has  set  up  within  each  university  in  England  and  Wales 
a  joint  committee,  on  which  the  workers'  organizations 
have  equal  representation  with  the  universities.  The  stu¬ 
dents  of  each  class  have  the  right  to  select  their  own  subject 
and  the  final  choice  in  the  selection  of  their  tutor.  Grants 

1  Classes  were  organized  under  a  Central  Joint  Advisory  Committee,  the  first  body 
that  ever  united  all  the  great  educational  institutions  for  a  common  object.  This 
committee  provided  the  supply  of  teachers,  while  the  Workers’  Educational  Association 
provided  for  the  demand  on  the  part  of  the  workers  and  the  actual  organization  of  the 
classes.  The  whole  control  of  the  movement  was  democratic  and  not  paternal  or 
patronizing.  The  Final  Report  of  the  Adult  Education  Committee  proposes  “the 
establishment  at  each  university  of  a  department  of  extra-mural  adult  education  with 
an  academic  head.”  See,  An  Adventure  in  Working  Class  Education  and  University 
Tutorial  Classes,  by  Albert  Mansbridge. 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


143 


are  received  from  university  funds,  the  Board  of  Educa¬ 
tion,  and  local  education  authorities  toward  the  cost  of 
tuition. 

In  addition  to  lectures,  conferences,  summer  schools  and 
literature,  the  Workers’  Educational  Association  seeks  to 
organize  tutorial  classes  with  not  more  than  thirty-two 
members  in  each,  who  are  pledged  to  a  three  years’  course 
of  serious  study  under  the  direction  of  a  joint  committee 
representing  the  universities  and  the  workers.  Each  class 
meets  twenty-four  times  a  year  for  an  hour’s  lecture  fol¬ 
lowed  by  at  least  an  hour’s  discussion.  A  high  standard 
of  continuous  study  is  aimed  at.  Essays  or  papers  are 
written  by  the  students,  usually  every  two  weeks.  The 
object  of  the  study  is  not  utilitarian  to  learn  a  trade  or  to 
make  money.  It  is  primarily  cultural  rather  than  practical, 
regarding  education  as  a  “means  of  life”  rather  than  a 
“means  of  livelihood.”  It  aims  to  develop  the  mind  and 
character  for  intelligent  citizenship  as  a  means  to  the  build¬ 
ing  of  a  better  social  order. 

The  principal  subjects  of  study  include  economics,  his¬ 
tory,  sociology,  the  natural  sciences,  modern  languages, 
literature  and  music.  The  following  subjects  have  been 
especially  emphasized:  Trade  Union  History  and  Prob¬ 
lems,  the  Co-operative  Movement,  History  of  Social  Move¬ 
ments,  Economic  and  Political  Theory,  International  Prob¬ 
lems,  Social  Psychology,  Industrial  History  and  Admin¬ 
istration.  The  aim  is  to  maintain  the  same  standard  as  in 
a  university  course.  The  students  pay  nominal  fees  which 
are  supplemented  by  grants  from  the  Board  of  Education 
and  the  universities.  The  Workers’  Educational  Associa¬ 
tion  is  a  “Federation  of  over  3,000  Educational  and 
Workers’  Organizations  non-sectarian  and  non-political.” 
Thus  the  universities  of  England  are  being  gradually 
democratized  and  the  workers  educated. 


144 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


In  addition  to  the  valuable  educational  work  done  by- 
Toynbee  Hall  and  other  social  settlements,  a  new  type  of 
non-residential  educational  settlement  has  now  been  or¬ 
ganized  under  the  Educational  Settlements  Association. 
The  Young  Men’s  Christian  Association,  although  at  pres¬ 
ent  hampered  for  lack  of  funds,  had  endeavored  to  carry 
on  its  educational  program  begun  on  such  a  large  scale  dur¬ 
ing  the  war,  when  the  Minister  of  Education  spoke  of 
their  having  developed  “the  largest  scheme  of  adult  educa¬ 
tion  which  has  ever  at  any  time  been  launched  from  this 
country.”1  Altogether  about  a  hundred  thousand  persons 
in  Great  Britain  are  receiving  the  benefits  of  adult  edu¬ 
cation  under  the  various  organizations  mentioned  above. 
Adult  education  in  their  view  is  “a  permanent  national 
necessity,  an  inseparable  aspect  of  citizenship  and  there¬ 
fore  should  be  both  universal  and  lifelong.” 

There  are  two  residental  labor  colleges  in  England: 
Buskin  College,  Oxford,  and  the  Labor  College,  London. 
The  former  was  founded  in  1891  to  provide  training  for 
leaders  of  labor  to  enable  them  to  achieve  their  social  and 
political  ideals.  Most  of  the  students  take  a  one  or  two 
year  course  and  are  supported  by  their  trade  unions.  The 
college  is  controlled  by  the  labor  organizations  which  sup¬ 
port  students,  and  it  maintains  a  large  Correspondence 
Department.  The  Labor  College,  London,  was  founded  in 
1909  on  a  Marxian  basis,  seeking  the  solution  of  labor 
problems  in  economic  and  material  causes  by  “the  eradica¬ 
tion  of  capitalist  economy.”2 

In  conclusion,  the  British  movement  seems  to  be  marked 
by  the  following  characteristics: 

1  “An  Educated  Nation,”  by  Basil  Yeaxlee,  p.  58. 

2  The  Labor  College  is  owned  and  controlled  by  the  Trade  Unions  of  Rail  way  men 
and  South  Wales  Miners.  It  has  a  propagandist  agency  in  the  Plebs  League  and  a 
scheme  of  working  class  education  throughout  the  country  under  the  National  Council 
of  Labor  Colleges. 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


145 


1.  There  is  a  high  idealism  which  characterizes  many 
of  its  leaders  as  men  of  moral  earnestness  and  spiritual 
aim.  The  leaders  are  not  doctrinaire  Marxian  Socialists, 
not  philosophical  Communists,  nor  are  they  merely  seek¬ 
ing  the  material  improvement  of  economic  conditions.  The 
British  Labor  Movement  has  an  ideal  soul,  expressed  in 
the  organism  of  a  well-articulated  body. 

2.  The  movement  is  well  balanced,  seeking  to  combine 
and  keep  in  due  proportion  industrial  and  political  action 
in  the  trade  unions  and  the  Labor  Party,  in  alliance  with 
an  effective  Co-operative  Movement  for  industrial  and 
agricultural  consumers  and  producers,  with  a  statesman¬ 
like  plan  of  workers’  education. 

3.  It  aims  at  a  broad  and  catholic  inclusion  of  workers 
and  intellectuals,  and  an  alliance  between  the  universities 
and  labor.  The  Fabian  Society,  begun  in  1884,  by  a  mod¬ 
erate,  non-Marxian  educational  policy  of  “permeation,”  is 
working  for  a  better  social  order.  With  only  some  two 
thousand  members,  its  influence  has  been  out  of  all  pro¬ 
portion  to  its  numbers.  The  movement  has  been  led  by 
such  men  as  Sidney  Webb  and  Bernard  Shaw,  and  has 
included  writers  like  H.  G.  Wells  and  Graham  Wallas. 
Today  the  labor  movement  includes  many  of  the  most 
distinguished  men  of  England  among  its  leaders  and  sym¬ 
pathizers,  as  well  as  a  growing  number  of  students  in  the 
universities.  The  Oxford  Labor  Club  is  the  largest  political 
club  in  the  university.  Among  the  leaders  and  sym¬ 
pathizers  of  the  British  Labor  Movement  would  be  included 
R.  H.  Tawney,  G.  D.  H.  Cole  and  a  score  of  leading 
economists;  writers  like  Bernard  Shaw,  Arnold  Bennett, 
H.  G.  Wells,  Thomas  Hardy,  H.  N.  Brailsford  and  Philip 
Snowden;  a  group  of  distinguished  playwrights,  sculptors 
and  artists;  churchmen  like  Bishop  Gore  and  the  Bishop 
of  Manchester;  and  political  leaders  like  Lord  Haldane 


146 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


and  Lord  Russell,  the  Buxtons  and  Colonel  Wedgewood. 
Among  its  one  hundred  and  forty-four  members  in  Parlia¬ 
ment  are  seventy-eight  Trade  Union  officials,  thirteen 
manual  workers,  ten  teachers  and  university  lecturers,  a 
dozen  authors  and  journalists,  three  barristers,  two  min¬ 
isters,  two  doctors  and  six  employers  or  merchants.  The 
party  is  widening  its  scope  to  take  in  men  of  the  finest 
idealism  in  Britain. 

4.  The  alliance  between  religion  and  labor,  at  least  in 
the  person  of  many  of  its  leaders.  The  Labor  Movement 
arose  out  of  the  Puritan  Movement  of  the  sixteenth  and 
seventeenth  centuries.  It  was  almost  born  in  the  Non¬ 
conformist  chapels.  Men  like  Keir  Hardie,  Arthur  Hen¬ 
derson,  and  Ramsey  MacDonald  gained  their  spiritual 
vision  and  drew  their  moral  enthusiasm  from  Christian 
sources.  The  Labor  Party  has  a  higher  spiritual  idealism 
than  either  of  the  older  political  parties.  It  does  not  talk 
of  “surplus  values”  but  of  human  values;  it  puts  the  right 
of  personality  above  property,  and  persons  above  things. 
It  counts  every  individual  a  sacred  person  with  moral 
rights  and  responsibilities.  It  would  not  allow  one  child 
to  be  hungry  or  ill-clad  while  there  is  superfluity  any¬ 
where.  While  the  above  is  true  of  many  of  the  leaders  and 
of  some  of  the  workers  it  probably  does  not  represent  the 
attitude  of  the  rank  and  file. 

5.  The  British  Labor  Movement  seeks  to  keep  the  bal¬ 
ance  between  national  and  international  interests,  as  well 
as  between  all  classes,  races,  and  nations.  It  is  not  a 
class  movement  seeking  a  dictatorship.  It  is  not  an 
aristocracy  of  labor  but  includes  the  unskilled  with  the 
skilled.  It  does  not  stand  for  “my  country  right  or  wrong” 
in  selfish  provincial  isolation  and  exclusive  nationalism, 
but  in  moral  leadership  it  seeks  to  serve  the  whole  world 
of  labor.  The  moral  capital  of  labor  is  not  found  in  radical 


THE  BRITISH  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


147 


Moscow  or  reactionary  Washington  but  in  London.  The 
Second  International  now  centers  there  with  a  joint  British 
Secretary.  The  creed  of  British  Labor  is  human,  inter¬ 
national  and  universal. 

6.  The  British  Labor  Movement  is  characterized  by  the 
notable  victories  it  has  won.  It  has  gained  the  practically 
undisputed  right  of  collective  bargaining  and  the  recogni¬ 
tion  of  the  Trade  Union  Movement.  It  has  co-operated  in 
establishing  through  the  government  a  system  of  Whitley 
Councils  for  the  democratic  consultation  of  employers  and 
employees  in  a  constitutionalized  industry.  By  the  Trade 
Boards  Act  sixty-three  Boards  are  in  operation  regulating 
the  wages  of  some  three  million  workers,  not  by  the  most 
miserly  employers,  but  by  the  best  minds  in  the  country. 
On  a  Trade  Board  there  are  usually  three  neutral  members 
appointed  by  the  government,  and  of  the  remainder  half 
represent  the  employers  and  half  the  employees  in  each 
industry.  These  Boards  have  been  a  potent  means  of 
maintaining  industrial  harmony. 

The  Labor  Movement  has  won  the  right  of  free  speech 
and  proved  the  wisdom  of  the  policy  of  an  open  safety 
valve  as  wiser  than  a  Czarist  system  of  reaction,  repres¬ 
sion,  imprisonment  and  deportation.  All  history  proves 
that  repressive  reactionaries  in  government  and  industry 
are  the  real  instigators  of  revolution.  As  a  result  there 
is  no  country  in  the  world  so  free  from  the  danger  of 
violent  revolution  as  England. 

We  have  only  to  contrast  the  conditions  of  a  century 
ago,  recorded  in  the  last  chapter,  with  the  movement  today 
to  see  the  enormous  and  lasting  gains  that  have  already 
been  achieved.  For  more  than  a  century  the  aristocracy, 
Parliament  and  employers  sought  to  crush  the  movement. 
Trade  unionists  were  long  regarded  as  the  pariahs  of  so¬ 
ciety.  But  that  day  has  passed  forever.  The  movement 


148 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


has  won  the  right  of  an  eight-hour  working  day  in  in¬ 
dustry.  Slowly  but  surely  it  has  lifted  the  standard  of 
life  and  has  steadily  improved  the  wages,  hours  and  condi¬ 
tions  of  the  workers.  Thus  after  long  centuries  of  oppres¬ 
sion  by  patient  effort,  organization,  education,  and  legis¬ 
lation,  the  British  Labor  Movement  has  won  its  present 
commanding  position. 


Chapter  VII 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 

While  in  Europe  we  endeavored  to  make  a  brief  survey 
of  labor  conditions  in  Germany,  France  and  Italy,  and  to 
study  the  development  of  the  International  Labor  Move¬ 
ment  at  the  Labor  Office  of  the  League  of  Nations  at 
Geneva,  the  International  Federation  of  Trade  Unions  at 
Amsterdam,  and  the  Red  Trade  Union  International  at 
Moscow.  Lack  of  space  compels  us  to  confine  ourselves 
to  the  barest  outline  of  the  present  situation  of  labor  in 
Europe. 

As  the  industrial  heart  of  Germany,  the  bone  of  conten¬ 
tion  between  France  and  other  nations,  and  the  danger 
zone  of  Europe  which  menaces  the  world  with  future  war, 
the  writer  visited  the  Ruhr  and  spent  a  week  investigating 
the  political  and  industrial  situation  there.  We  feel  the 
necessity  of  describing  this  situation  because  it  is  the  key 
not  only  of  Germany,  but  also  of  the  industrial  situation  in 
Europe,  and  is  the  chief  menace  to  world  peace. 

France  had  tightened  her  last  strangle  hold  upon  Ger¬ 
many's  jugular  vein  in  the  Ruhr.  She  had  already,  through 
the  terms  of  the  Treaty,  obtained  possession  of  Germany's 
entire  coal  fields  of  the  Saar.  She  had  seen  Germany  dis¬ 
possessed  of  three-fourths  of  her  coal  in  Upper  Silesia, 
despite  the  fact  that  60  per  cent  of  the  entire  population 
voted  in  the  plebiscite  that  the  territory  should  go  to 
Germany.  Germany  then  had  left  the  single  large  coal 
field  in  the  Ruhr,  producing  72  per  cent  of  her  remaining 

149 


150 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


supply  of  coal.  If  this  could  be  taken  and  kept,  her 
economic  ruin  would  be  assured.  For  this  was  her  vital 
industrial  district  and  contained  her  most  valuable  mines, 
steel,  iron  and  other  industries. 

I  write  as  a  friend  and  admirer  of  the  French  people. 
During  the  war  I  wrote  the  strongest  condemnation  of 
Prussian  militarism  of  which  I  was  capable.  Space  forbids 
a  full  statement  of  the  French  case — the  suffering  of  France 
in  the  devastated  areas,  her  rightful  demand  for  just  repa¬ 
rations  and  adequate  security,  her  memory  of  the  wrongs 
of  the  German  occupation  of  Belgium  and  Northern  France 
during  the  war.  The  nature  of  the  occupation  in  the  Ruhr 
is  not  caused  by  any  cruelty  of  the  French  people.  It  is 
only  a  part  of  the  system  of  militarism  with  its  inevitable 
inhumanity  and  injustice  and  menace  of  future  wrar  for 
the  world. 

But  I  must  state  now  frankly  the  painful  impressions  I 
have  received  after  visiting  the  principal  cities  in  the  Ruhr. 
I  found  the  protest  of  Germany  and  the  British,  Dutch  and 
neutral  witnesses  of  the  French  occupation  centering  in  the 
following  seven  points: 

1.  The  blockade  or  paralysis  of  railways,  posts,  telegraph 
and  telephones,  and  the  military  occupation  of  all  the  best 
and  largest  schools,  so  that  thousands  of  children  were  pre¬ 
vented  from  attending  school  more  than  two  or  three  hours 
a  day  in  the  few  remaining  overcrowded  buildings. 

2.  The  stifling  of  industry.  I  found  tracks  leading  to  the 
larger  industrial  works  that  had  been  torn  up  by  the  French 
soldiers  so  that  coal  could  not  go  in  nor  the  manufactured 
product  be  shipped  out.  Whether  rightly  or  wrongly,  the 
people  seemed  unanimously  to  believe  in  the  deliberate 
attempt  of  the  French  to  weaken  their  economic  resources, 
and  I  found  no  Germans  and  few  neutrals  in  all  the  Ruhr 
or  in  all  Europe  who  believed  that  France’s  real  purpose 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


151 


was  merely  to  collect  reparations.  Many  admit  to  me  that 
Germany  could  pay  large  sums.  No  one  believes,  however, 
she  could  pay  the  impossible  sums  thus  far  proposed.  The 
industrialists  are  not  eager  to  come  forward  to  pay  repara¬ 
tions  or  indefinite  and  incalculable  claims  which  they  be¬ 
lieve  will  not  hasten  Germany’s  release  but  her  ruin,  and 
which  they  feel  have  been  deliberately  planned  and  care¬ 
fully  calculated  as  impossible  of  fulfillment,  to  prevent  her 
recovery  and  insure  her  downfall  or  dismemberment. 

3.  The  deporting  of  leaders  in  the  Ruhr  in  all  ranks  and 
walks  of  life.  At  the  date  of  my  visit  it  was  reliably 
reported  that  sixty-four  Germans  had  already  been  shot, 
hundreds  were  in  prison,  and  78,537  had  been  evicted  or 
expelled  from  the  territory.  And  the  numbers  were  growing 
daily. 

4.  The  repeated  and  systematic  seizing  of  private  money 
from  banks,  treasuries  of  city  halls,  from  printing  presses 
and  in  several  cities  even  the  robbing  of  private  individuals 
upon  the  streets.  In  every  city  I  visited  I  found  that  one 
or  more  of  the  banks  had  had  all  the  money  and  treasure 
taken  from  them  by  the  French  authorities.  Some  of  these 
were  the  commercial  and  private  banks,  and  some  the 
private  Reichsbanks.  For  instance,  at  Essen  ninety -two 
milliards  of  marks  were  taken  from  the  bank.  All  of  this 
was  private  money  kept  on  hand  for  several  hundred  thou¬ 
sand  workers  who  are  dependent  upon  this  bank  for  the 
payment  of  their  wages. 

On  Saturday,  June  23,  1923,  when  I  arrived  in  Mulheim 
I  learned  that  the  bank  had  just  been  rifled  that  morning. 
I  found  the  French  soldiers  still  in  possession.  I  was  too 
late  to  see  the  treasure  taken  away.  I  learned,  however, 
that  another  robbery  was  taking  place  at  that  very  moment 
just  up  the  street.  I  proceeded  at  once  to  the  Ernst  Marks 
Printing  Press,  which  has  been  printing  twenty-thousand- 


152 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


mark  notes  for  the  banks  and  industrial  works.  Sixteen 
French  officers  and  soldiers  were  in  possession  of  the  prop¬ 
erty,  with  an  automobile  and  a  large  auto  truck  waiting 
at  the  door  to  take  away  the  money.  A  large  crowd  had 
gathered  outside.  Finally  the  officers  and  soldiers  came 
out.  I  was  pushed  back  with  the  crowd  as  the  soldiers 
cleared  the  sidewalk.  The  man  on  my  right  showed  the 
suggestion  of  a  smile,  apparently  at  their  failure  to  obtain 
the  money  for  which  they  were  looking.  A  French  officer 
seized  and  shook  him,  saying,  “Were  you  laughing  at  me?” 
The  man  replied,  “No,  I  was  not.”  He  was  then  picked 
up  bodily  and  thrown  into  the  truck  and  taken  away  to 
prison. 

While  in  Paris  I  talked  with  members  of  the  Rhineland 
Commission.  They  admit  the  repeated  taking  of  money 
from  the  banks  in  the  Ruhr.  In  Gelsenkirchen  I  found 
that  during  eight  days  of  a  reign  of  terror  private  citizens 
were  held  up  and  robbed  upon  the  streets  by  French  offi¬ 
cers  and  soldiers.  I  have  in  my  possession  a  list  of  forty- 
four  men  with  the  exact  amount  taken  from  each,  totaling 
8,783,292  marks.  Upon  inquiry  at  the  Rhineland  Commis¬ 
sion  in  Paris  I  found  that  they  admit  individuals  had  all 
their  money  seized  in  the  streets  of  Gelsenkirchen,  that  it 
was  a  “mistake”  of  the  commanding  French  officer,  who 
misunderstood  his  orders,  and  that  the  money  will  be 
credited  to  reparations.  This  is  no  “credit”  but  a  debit 
to  the  honor  of  France  and  caused  burning  indignation  of 
the  whole  population  of  Germany.  The  witness  who  told 
me  of  the  robberies  and  crimes  committed  in  Gelsenkirchen 
said,  “Do  you  wonder  that,  when  I  had  to  save  my  wife 
three  times  in  one  day  from  violence  at  the  hands  of  French 
soldiers,  my  son  is  growing  up  with  all  the  other  children 
to  hate  the  French?” 

5,  In  certain  cities  in  the  Ruhr  the  Germans  have  been 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


153 


deeply  stirred  by  the  needless  and  gratuitous  indignities 
and  insults  connected  with  arrests,  personal  violence  and 
the  beating  of  their  citizens.  I  saw  an  aged  banker  who 
had  been  beaten  with  such  violence  that  his  ear  drum  was 
broken,  his  nose  swollen  and  bleeding,  and  he  will  suffer 
for  some  time  from  the  effects  of  his  injuries.  He  wept 
as  he  described  to  me  his  beating  and  debasing  imprison¬ 
ment.  I  have  myself  investigated  enough  cases  in  person 
and  seen  enough  of  the  bruised  bodies  of  men  to  be  con¬ 
vinced  beyond  any  shadow  of  doubt  of  deliberate,  inten¬ 
tional  cruelty,  insult  and  beating  in  certain  cities  that  was 
wholly  unnecessary.  But  in  other  cities  I  found  the 
Germans  testifying  that  their  prisoners  had  been  treated 
with  consideration. 

6.  There  is  overwhelming  evidence  of  the  tightening  grip 
of  a  terrible  “ hunger  blockade”  upon  this  last  vital  eco¬ 
nomic  center  of  Germany.  The  people  of  the  Ruhr  know 
too  well  the  meaning  of  this  menace.  They  well  remember 
the  terrible  years  when  the  Allied  hunger  blockade  was 
killing  a  hundred  thousand  women,  children  and  old  men 
a  year  in  Germany.  Even  now  in  several  cities  in  the 
Ruhr  I  found  the  bread  line  waiting,  trying  to  buy  food 
in  gradually  diminishing  quantities.  The  French  have 
never  forbidden  all  food  supplies,  but  these  have  not  been 
sufficient  to  meet  the  needs  of  the  population.  Hunger 
strikes  below  the  belt  of  every  laboring  man,  every  mother 
and  every  child.  I  have  seen  some  children  in  the  hospitals 
underfed,  sick  or  dying  from  the  use  of  spoiled  milk  held 
up  too  long  in  transit.  I  saw  the  bent,  bow-legs  of  the 
children  of  the  workers  with  softened  bones,  suffering  from 
rickets  due  to  undernourishment  during  the  war.  The  doc¬ 
tor  in  charge  of  the  hospital  told  me  that  90  per  cent  of 
the  children  whom  he  had  examined  after  the  war  were 
suffering  from  rickets  and  10  per  cent  were  left  perma- 


154 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


nently  crippled.  I  have  entered  the  homes  of  the  workmen 
and  seen  some  of  their  children  of  six  and  seven  years  of 
age  who  have  never  walked. 

7.  One  of  the  worst  effects  of  the  present  policy  seems 
to  be  the  letting  loose  upon  the  Ruhr  of  red  communism. 
The  workers  in  this  particular  section  are  the  most  radical 
of  all  Germany.  The  French  have  disarmed  practically 
the  entire  German  police  throughout  the  occupied  area.  In 
the  recent  coinmunist  uprising  no  protection  was  left  the 
manufacturers  or  loyal  workers  save  the  unarmed  fire  de¬ 
partment  and  the  “Protective  Association”  of  the  workers. 
When  the  communists  attacked  one  of  the  factories  which 
I  visited,  the  fire  department  even  without  arms  was  suc¬ 
cessfully  quelling  the  revolt  and  pressing  them  back.  As 
they  passed  the  French  military  center  by  the  bridge,  the 
French  officer  rushed  out  and  blew  his  whistle.  He  was 
immediately  followed  by  French  soldiers  who  with  the  butts 
of  their  rifles  or  bayonets  attacked  the  German  fire  depart¬ 
ment  which  was  peacefully  but  successfully  pushing  back 
the  communists.  With  the  assistance  of  the  French,  the 
communists  now  joined  in  the  attack  and  dispersed  the  fire 
department.  I  have  before  me  the  sworn  affidavits  of 
thirteen  of  these  men  who  verify  these  facts.  I  also  have 
the  testimony  of  employers  and  of  laborers  in  several  cities. 
Germany  is  at  this  hour  threatened  with  revolution  as  the 
result  of  the  French  occupation. 

The  Ruhr  will  never  largely  produce  coal  under  bayo¬ 
nets.  Even  Prussia  never  dared  station  a  garrison  among 
these  hardy  miners,  save  a  small  contingent  at  Mulheim. 
They  would  not  even  work  under  German  bayonets.  It  is 
not  merely  that  the  present  policy  in  the  Ruhr  is  doomed 
to  fail,  but  we  tremble  for  the  future,  for  the  seeds  of 
another  war  are  being  sown  with  more  terrible  certainty 
than  in  1870  or  1914.  And  the  gathering  conscience  of  the 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


155 


democratic  world  must  condemn  it.  I  have  no  hope  ov 
counteracting  the  long  years  of  war  propaganda  since  1914, 
but  I  desire  to  bear  witness  against  this  menace  which  the 
leaders  in  Britain,  Italy  and  neutral  Europe  now  know  only 
too  well  and  which  even  isolated  America  will  realize  in 
time. 

It  is  significant  that  the  militarist  policy  of  France  is 
unsparingly  condemned  by  the  whole  world  of  labor — 
French,  German,  British,  Italian,  Russian  and  neutrals. 
The  invasion  of  the  Ruhr  has  not  only  impoverished  Ger¬ 
many  and  indefinitely  postponed  and  lessened  possible 
indemnities,  as  was  foreseen  and  foretold  in  each  British 
note  of  protest,  it  has  already  started  the  divisive  and 
disruptive  process  of  the  German  Republic  that  was  de¬ 
sired.  Volumes  could  be  written  to  prove  that  this  was  the 
real  object  of  France.  General  Pershing’s  own  report  to 
President  Wilson  as  early  as  May  22,  1919,  shows  that 
even  then  France  desired  revolution  and  the  dismember¬ 
ment  of  Germany.  General  Pershing  states  that  General 
Mangin  sent  a  staff  officer  to  inquire  what  the  American 
attitude  would  be  toward  a  separate  Rhineland  Republic: 
“The  staff  officer  stated  that  they  had  fifty  deputies  ready 
to  send  into  the  American  sector  to  assist  in  starting  the 
revolution.”1 

Mr.  G.  Lowes  Dickinson  reminds  us  of  the  fact  that 
during  the  crisis  of  the  Peace  Conference,  M.  Clemenceau, 
although  in  certain  regards  yielding  to  President  Wilson, 
turned  to  President  Poincare  with  these  highly  significant 
words:  “Mr.  President,  you  are  much  younger  than  I.  In 
fifteen  years  the  Germans  will  not  have  executed  all  these 
clauses  of  the  treaty,  and  in  fifteen  years,  if  you  do  me  the 

1  See  further  evidence  in  Ray  Stannard  Baker’s  Woodrow  Wilson  and  World  Settle¬ 
ment. 

Also  “France  and  the  Peace  of  Europe”  by  Kirby  Page. 


156 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


honor  to  come  to  my  tomb,  you  will  be  able  to  say  to  me, 
I  am  convinced  of  it,  lWe  are  on  the  Rhine  and  we  shall 
stay  there ”  They  will  stay  there,  because  the  treaty  was 
calculated  for  this  very  purpose  by  the  French. 

The  German  labor  movement  may  be  examined  first  as 
the  largest  on  the  continent  of  Europe.  Karl  Marx  issued 
his  “Communist  Manifesto”  in  1848  picturing  the  misery 
of  the  workers  and  calling  upon  them  to  unite.  Bismarck 
endeavored  to  crush  the  labor  movement  by  the  Anti- 
Socialist  Law  of  1878,  which  was  finally  repealed  after 
its  utter  failure  to  check  the  irrepressible  aspirations  of 
the  masses.  The  Social  Democratic  Party  grew  steadily 
in  power  until  in  1912  they  had  polled  over  a  third  of 
the  total  national  vote,  returning  110  members  to  the 
Reichstag. 

The  Trade  Union  Movement  of  Germany  enrolled 
4,513,000  in  1913;  it  trebled  in  size  during  the  war  and 
today  numbers  over  12,000,0004 

Instead  of  society  breaking  up  horizontally  in  a  class 
war,  as  Marx  had  prophesied,  Europe  broke  vertically  on 
nationalist  lines  in  1914.  Following  the  failure  of  the 
March  German  offensive  in  1918  came  the  revolution  of 
November  9.  The  Socialists  put  down  the  radical  Sparta- 
cist  uprising  and  formed  a  Coalition  Government  with  the 
Catholics  and  Democrats,  with  Ebert,  a  conservative  Social 
Democratic  labor  leader,  as  President. 

Under  the  new  Constitution  of  1919,  Germany  became 
a  democratic  Republic.  Almost  the  first  act  of  the  new 
government  was  to  sweep  away  all  the  restrictions  of  the 

1  Of  these  approximately  8,500,000  belong  to  the  General  Federation  of  Trade 
Unions,  chiefly  Social  Democrats.  Nearly  2,000,000  are  in  the  more  conservative 
Hirsch-Duncker  Trade  Unions  which  seek  a  closer  co-operation  between  capital  and 
abor;  and  over  2,000,000  are  in  the  Christian  Trade  Unions.  The  latter  were  founded 
in  1893,  being  unable  to  agree  with  the  anti-religious  program  of  class  war  advocated 
by  the  Marxian  Unions. 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


157 


old  paternal  system  which  had  always  distrusted  and 
handicapped  the  workers  as  second-grade  citizens.  Im¬ 
mediate  provision  was  made  for  a  maximum  8-hour  working 
day,  an  adequate  employment  exchange  system,  unemploy¬ 
ment  relief,  and  conciliation  committees  for  industrial  dis¬ 
putes.  The  labor  code  of  the  Constitution  of  1919  is  based 
on  principles  of  equal  justice,  economic  freedom,  the  right 
of  free  association,  a  comprehensive  scheme  of  social  insur¬ 
ance  and  a  universal  maximum  of  rights  to  the  working 
classes.  “Manual  and  non-manual  workers  shall  be  called 
upon  to  co-operate  with  employers  on  an  equal  footing  in 
the  regulation  of  wages  and  labor  conditions,  as  well  as  the 
whole  economic  development  of  production.  The  organiza¬ 
tions  of  both  sides  shall  be  recognized.” 

The  Works  Councils  Act  of  1920  provides  for  the  creation 
of  councils  representing  the  workers  in  all  establishments 
employing  not  less  than  twenty  workmen.  These  Councils 
assist  the  managing  body  by  advice,  co-operate  in  the 
introduction  of  new  methods,  and  are  concerned  in  the 
maintenance  of  wages.  They  appoint  one  or  more  mem¬ 
bers  on  the  Board  of  Directors  and  they  are  entitled  to  a 
quarterly  report,  an  annual  balance  sheet  and  inspection 
of  the  books. 

The  majority  of  the  employers  whom  the  writer  inter¬ 
viewed  in  Berlin,  the  Ruhr  and  Upper  Silesia  felt  that  the 
Councils  were  on  the  whole  working  well. 

It  was  not  until  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  century  that 
collective  bargaining  was  definitely  established  here.  Now 
Germany  has  a  highly  constitutionalized  industry.  Boards 
of  arbitration  are  provided  for  the  settlement  of  industrial 
disputes.  The  organizations  of  trade  unions  and  employ¬ 
ers’  associations  are  both  officially  recognized.  Machinery 
is  provided  for  joint  boards  to  bring  both  parties  together, 
locally,  in  districts  and  nationally.  Arbitration  courts  are 


158 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


constituted,  consisting  ordinarily  of  three  labor  members, 
three  employers,  and  three  impartial  members  representing 
the  community.  The  Minister  of  Labor,  who  appoints  the 
chairman,  may  declare  binding  the  action  of  the  court  or 
board  if  the  decision  is  sustained  by  six  votes. 

The  more  than  twelve  millions  now  in  organized  trade 
unions  in  Germany  represent  with  their  families  about  half 
of  the  total  population.  Their  representatives  constitute 
the  largest  single  party  in  the  Reichstag. 

Economic  conditions  after  the  war  have,  however, 
plunged  multitudes  of  the  middle  classes  and  the  six  mil¬ 
lions  of  pensioners,  unemployed  and  disabled,  into  abject 
poverty.  Germany  lost  through  the  war  13  per  cent  of 
her  area,  10  per  cent  of  her  population,  25  per  cent  of  her 
coal  production  before  the  occupation  of  the  Ruhr  which 
produced  72  per  cent  of  the  remainder,  74  per  cent  of  her 
iron  ore,  15.7  per  cent  of  her  wheat  and  rye,  18  per  cent 
of  her  production  of  potatoes,  and  89  per  cent  of  her  mer¬ 
chant  marine.  The  writer  inspected  a  number  of  the  poorest 
homes  in  the  slums,  where  he  found  people  actually  starv¬ 
ing.  They  revealed  the  very  dregs  of  the  war.  At  the 
moment  of  writing,  Germany  seems  to  be  threatened  with 
revolution  and  chaos.  Germany  is  in  danger  of  becoming 
by  the  very  terms  of  the  Treaty  the  sweatshop  of  the  world. 
The  whole  standard  of  living  has  been  lowered  for  the  Ger¬ 
man  workmen.  Wages  are  just  above,  or  often  below,  the 
minimum  of  existence.  Food  is  scarce  and  of  bad  quality. 
Clothing  is  out  of  reach.  The  consistent  military  policy  in 
the  Ruhr  threatens  Germany  with  chaos  and  the  world 
with  war. 

The  labor  movement  of  France  was  born  in  the  abject 
poverty  that  preceded  the  French  Revolution  of  1789  and 
it  has  always  been  characterized  by  its  somewhat  volcanic 
and  revolutionary  character.  The  result  has  been  reac- 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


159 


tionary  repression  on  the  part  of  the  government  and 
employers,  which  in  turn  drives  the  workers  further  along 
the  road  to  radicalism. 

The  French  Revolution  for  the  bourgeois  class  in  the 
name  of  “liberty,  equality  and  fraternity”  suppressed  the 
old  guilds  and  devised  savage  punishments  for  all  com¬ 
binations  of  wage  earners  seeking  to  improve  their  situa¬ 
tion.  Working  conditions  were  more  deplorable  than  those 
in  England  or  Germany.  The  bayonet  has  repeatedly  been 
taken  as  the  solution  of  internal  labor  troubles  in  France, 
as  it  has  been  of  her  international  problems.  The  gains  of 
labor  under  Napoleon  III  were  followed  by  the  savage  sup¬ 
pression,  killing  and  transportation  of  thousands  of  laborers 
after  the  war  of  1870.  The  treatment  labor  receives  in 
each  country  tends  to  mold  the  movement,  and  usually  a 
country  gets  the  kind  of  labor  movement  it  deserves. 
Reaction  produces  radicalism. 

In  1895  the  General  Confederation  of  Labor,  or  C.  G.  T., 
was  organized.  Following  the  war  the  labor  movement  had 
won  the  right  of  collective  bargaining,  an  eight-hour  work¬ 
ing  day,  and  a  Social  Insurance  Bill  on  March  22,  1921, 
which  seemed  to  promise  a  new  epoch  favorable  to  a  better 
standard  of  life. 

The  French  Labor  Movement  in  common  with  the  Latin 
countries  has  drawn  its  inspiration  not  only  from  the  State 
Socialism  of  Marx  but  also  from  the  more  radical  Anarch¬ 
ism  of  the  Russian  revolutionary  Bakunin.  Former  Social¬ 
ists  like  Millerand,  President  of  France,  and  former  Premier 
Briand  and  Viviana  have  left  the  party  or  have  been 
expelled  from  it  after  deserting  their  fellow-workers  and 
rising  to  power.  Some  have  used  the  military  power  of  the 
state  to  shoot  down  strikers  and  crush  the  labor  movement. 
With  a  growing  cynicism  toward  any  hope  of  improvement 
from  constitutional  political  action,  Syndicalism  arose  in 


160 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


France  in  revolt  against  political  Socialism.  While  the 
workers  of  Britain  and  Germany  emphasized  political  ac¬ 
tion,  the  workers  of  France  turned  toward  industrial  or 
“direct  action,”  advocating  sabotage  and  the  general  strike 
as  “the  complete  and  simultaneous  stoppage  of  production 
which  must  render  impossible  the  normal  functioning  of 
capitalist  society.”  They  regarded  the  state  merely  as  the 
oppressive  tool  of  the  capitalist  class  and  advocated  its 
abolition,  so  that  the  proletarian  producers  could  destroy 
the  wage  system  and  institute  industrial  self-government. 

Unfortunately  French  labor  has  always  shown  a  tendency 
to  strife  and  internal  division  and  subdivision.  The  Gen¬ 
eral  Federation  of  Labor  had  advanced  from  about  half  a 
million  before  the  war  to  some  two  millions  after  it,  only 
to  fall  again  to  a  million  or  less  through  internal  dissension 
introduced  by  the  split  over  Communism.  The  war 
brought  a  large  accession  of  revolutionary  members.  In 
1920  the  C.  G.  T.  Congress  condemned  the  French  Govern¬ 
ment  as  “the  servile  tool  of  reaction  all  over  the  world”  and 
declared  in  favor  of  the  Red  Moscow  Third  International. 
The  majority  of  the  French  Socialist  Party  during  the  same 
year  became  the  Communist  Party,  which  in  turn  has  been 
divided  by  constant  internal  dissension. 

On  January  13,  1921,  the  court  ordered  the  dissolution 
of  the  General  Federation  of  Labor,  and  there  has  been  a 
combined  movement  against  labor  on  the  part  of  the 
government  and  employers.  There  is  a  counter  offensive 
against  the  eight-hour-day  law,  which  had  applied  to  the 
whole  of  industry  and  commerce,  and  against  the  new  wage 
scale.  Although  legally  dissolved,  the  C.  G.  T.  practically 
exists,  but  labor  is  on  the  defensive,  fighting  for  its  exis¬ 
tence  against  the  reactionary  forces  without  and  revolu¬ 
tionary  disruption  within. 

Organized  French  labor  is  against  the  government’s  mili- 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


161 


tarist  policy  in  the  Ruhr.  In  principle  the  labor  movements 
of  France  and  Germany  are  agreed  that  Germany  should 
pay  in  full  to  the  utmost  limit  of  her  capacity  just  repara¬ 
tions  in  money,  materials  and  workers  for  reconstruction  in 
France  and  Belgium.  This  the  German  Government  under 
Rathenau  offered  to  do,  but  it  was  rejected  by  the  mili¬ 
tarists  and  big  employers  of  France.  The  majority  of  the 
leaders  of  the  labor  movements  of  France  and  Germany 
believe  that  the  Allied  demand  of  thirty-two  billion  gold 
dollars  in  reparations  was  a  preposterous  and  an  impossible 
sum  fixed  by  French  politicians  for  “home  consumption, ” 
for  propaganda  and  militarist  purposes.  Labor  long  ago 
came  to  an  agreement  that  could  have  settled  the  whole 
question  of  the  Treaties,  reparations  and  the  Ruhr,  but  it 
was  contrary  to  the  policy  of  the  militarists  and  indus¬ 
trialists  who  determined  the  policy  of  France  while  labor 
was  divided  and  fighting  for  its  life. 

The  Labor  Movement  of  Italy  is  similar  to  that  of 
France  in  its  past  history  of  radical  Syndicalism  and  in  its 
present  divided  and  weakened  condition.  Space  forbids  a 
record  of  the  shockingly  bad  conditions  under  which  labor 
suffered  in  Italy  and  its  long  struggle  for  justice.  In  gen¬ 
eral  the  Teutonic  countries  of  Northern  and  Central  Europe 
followed  Marx  in  his  belief  in  the  state  as  the  agency  of 
social  revolution,  while  the  Latin  countries  of  the  South 
followed  Bakunin  in  his  repudiation  of  the  state  and  belief 
in  the  Syndicalist  movement  of  the  workers  substituting 
industrial  for  political  action.  From  1906  the  revolutionary 
Italian  Syndicalist  Union  was  formed  and  at  the  outbreak 
of  the  war  the  Socialist  Party  was  under  the  leadership  of 
Mussolini  and  other  revolutionaries. 

The  General  Federation  of  Labor  enrolled  half  a  million 
workers  before  the  war,  and  by  1920  there  were  3,100,000 


162 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


in  organized  unions,  of  whom  59  per  cent,  or  1,833,000,  were 
agricultural  workers. 

Italy  emerged  from  the  war  impoverished,  discouraged, 
disillusioned.  Seizing  the  moment  of  reaction  and  depres¬ 
sion  the  radical  international  Socialists  and  Communists 
captured  the  National  Council  of  the  Socialist  Party  in 
1920  and  voted  to  prepare  for  the  establishment  of  soviets, 
the  dictatorship  of  the  proletariat,  the  seizure  of  the  fac¬ 
tories  by  the  industrial  workers  and  of  farms  by  the  peas¬ 
ants,  following  the  example  of  Russia. 

On  August  30,  1920,  the  metal  workers  in  reply  to  a 
threatened  lockout  of  the  employers  took  possession  of  the 
plants.  Soon  some  five  hundred  factories  in  Northern  Italy 
had  been  seized  by  the  workers.  Land  was  forcibly  appro¬ 
priated  by  the  poor  peasants  in  the  South,  often  under  the 
leadership  of  the  priests,  in  sympathy  for  their  impover¬ 
ished  condition. 

Factories  were  operated  under  their  own  shop  committees. 
The  workers  slept  on  the  premises,  working  in  three  eight- 
hour  shifts  under  strict  discipline  of  their  own.  They  were 
given  almost  a  free  hand  for  their  experiment,  as  the  em¬ 
ployers  scarcely  resisted  and  the  weak  government  did  not 
interfere.  Indeed  it  supported  labor’s  demand  for  a  share 
in  the  control  of  industry.  The  workers  succeeded  for  a 
time  in  increasing  production,  but  in  all  else  they  confessed 
to  complete  failure.  They  could  command  no  adequate 
supply  of  raw  materials,  no  credit  or  banking  facilities,  no 
means  of  distribution  and  exchange,  no  control  of  the  state 
to  coordinate  their  efforts  or  enforce  their  decrees. 

Labor  suddenly  found  itself  incompetent  to  run  either 
industry  or  government.  Labor  leaders  thus  stated  their 
own  case  to  the  writer:  “We  were  divided  and  wTe  failed. 
We  gave  the  people  neither  reform  nor  revolution.  We 
lacked  education,  preparation  and  a  constructive  program. 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


163 


We  had  neither  the  power,  the  unity  nor  the  courage  to 
seize  the  government  as  Mussolini  did.  Nor  had  we  the 
intelligence  in  our  party  to  run  it  successfully  if  we  had 
seized  it.  Thus  our  movement  collapsed  from  within,  and 
was  met  by  the  fierce  opposition  from  without  of  public 
opinion  which  now  turned  against  us.” 

The  destructive  violence  of  the  Communists  of  Italy  led 
to  the  reaction  of  the  Fascisti.  Communist  international¬ 
ism  produced  the  violent  reaction  of  patriotic  nationalism. 
The  leader  of  the  new  movement  was  Mussolini,  the  son  of 
a  Socialist  village  blacksmith,  who  began  life  as  a  manual 
laborer  and  later  became  a  school  master. 

Mussolini  began  his  first  organization  of  Fascisti  groups 
in  Milan  on  March  25,  1919.  The  youth  of  Italy  through¬ 
out  the  provinces,  the  young  officers,  ex-soldiers  and  all  the 
elements  of  patriotic  nationalism  and  conservatism  in  the 
nation  soon  rallied  to  the  movement  to  put  down  revolu¬ 
tionary  Communism.  Meeting  violence  with  violence,  they 
soon  outdid  the  Communists  and  instituted  a  reign  of  terror. 
They  burned,  pillaged  or  destroyed  some  two  hundred  and 
fifty  chambers  of  labor,  a  hundred  co-operative  societies, 
a  dozen  labor  newspaper  offices,  and  killed  some  twenty-five 
hundred  of  their  opponents. 

With  a  hundred  thousand  of  the  black-shirted  Fascisti 
troops,  Mussolini  marched  on  Rome,  seized  the  reins  of 
government,  and  suddenly  found  himself  Dictator  of  Italy. 
With  stern  discipline  and  force  he  set  to  work  to  reform  the 
lax  and  wasteful  public  services.  He  made  strenuous 
efforts  to  balance  the  budget  and  subjected  Italy  to  strict 
discipline.  He  claims  that  democracy  is  bankrupt  and 
adopts  as  his  motto  “hierarchy  and  discipline.” 

He  has  sought  further  to  divide  and  weaken  the  tempo¬ 
rarily  shattered  labor  movement  of  Italy  which,  like  the 


164 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


French  movement,  has  always  suffered  from  internal  dis¬ 
sension.  Italy  has  always  produced  great  soloists  and  indi¬ 
vidualists,  never  a  great  chorus. 

Already  the  Fascisti  Labor  Movement  with  the  powerful 
backing  of  the  government  and  the  allurement  of  promised 
employment  and  rewards  has  captured  over  a  million  mem¬ 
bers.  From  1913  to  1920  the  Italian  Labor  Movement  had 
increased  from  972,000  to  3,100,000  in  members.  It  had 
secured  an  eight-hour  day,  valuable  collective  agreements, 
a  bill  of  rights  for  labor,  the  unchallenged  right  of  collec¬ 
tive  bargaining  and  a  growing  constitutionalism  in  industry. 
But  unprepared  and  uneducated,  it  followed  the  leadership 
of  revolutionary  violence.  As  a  result  it  is  now  divided, 
disrupted  and  opposed  by  repressive  reaction  which  has  left 
but  little  liberty. 

Labor  in  Italy  is  learning  its  bitter  lesson  and  will  now 
seek  slowly  to  rebuild  its  shattered  movement  on  truer  and 
firmer  foundations  than  those  of  class  hatred,  force  and 
dictatorship.  For  dictatorship,  whether  of  capital  or  labor, 
of  Czar  or  proletariat,  brings  in  the  end  its  own  destruction 
unless  it  voluntarily  yields  to  a  true  democracy. 

Turning  from  individual  countries  we  may  now  trace 
briefly  the  development  of  the  International  Labor  Move¬ 
ment.  Man  has  now  reached  an  international  stage  of  de¬ 
velopment  and  is  slowly  evolving  an  international  mind 
expressed  in  various  organizations.  More  than  five  hun¬ 
dred  such  existed  even  before  the  war  which  has  forced  the 
whole  world  into  closer  relations. 

The  First  Labor  International  has  its  origin  in  Marx  and 
Engel’s  Communist  Manifesto  of  1848  with  its  call,  “Work¬ 
ingmen  of  all  countries,  unite!”  This  took  concrete  form 
in  1864.  Beginning  as  an  industrial  movement  of  English 
and  French  workers  to  improve  working  conditions,  it 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


165 


gradually  evolved  into  a  political  movement  to  change  the 
principles  underlying  the  present  order  of  society,  led  by 
the  intellectuals  of  Germany  and  France.  For  eight  years 
the  movement  spread  in  many  lands.  Trade  union  organ¬ 
ization  on  the  British  model  was  extended  throughout  the 
continent  of  Europe.  A  series  of  conferences  was  held  to 
improve  the  condition  of  the  workers.  The  conferences 
were  at  first  mildly  liberal,  but  from  1868  the  influence  of 
Marx  became  dominant,  and  the  International  stood  for  the 
socialization  of  land  and  the  means  of  communication  under 
workers’  control.  The  movement  was  disrupted  by  the  bit¬ 
ter  and  often  petty  personal  quarrels  between  the  followers 
of  the  socialist  Karl  Marx  and  the  anarchist  Michael 
Bakunin. 

The  Second  International  originated  in  Paris  in  1889 
chiefly  in  an  attempt  to  unite  the  workers  of  the  world 
against  militarism.  Conferences  were  held  in  the  various 
cities  of  Europe  until  the  Second  International  was  dis¬ 
rupted  by  the  war,  when  labor,  which  had  been  organized 
horizontally  on  class  lines  throughout  the  world,  split  on 
vertical  national  lines.  The  Conferences  of  the  Second 
International  were  resumed  with  difficulty  after  the  war. 

The  Third  or  Communist  International  was  organized  in 
Moscow  in  1919  under  the  domination  of  the  Russian  Soviet 
leaders.  It  stands  for  the  nationalization  of  economic  life 
controlled  by  workingmen’s  soviets.  The  Congress  held  in 
Moscow  in  1920  had  minority  representation  from  nearly 
every  country.  The  newly  adopted  constitution  advocates 
“the  dictatorship  of  the  proletariat  and  of  the  International 
Soviet  Republic,  the  complete  abolition  of  classes  and  the 
realization  of  Socialism  as  the  first  step  to  Communist 
society.” 

The  Third  International  has  been  joined  by  the  minority 


166 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


party  of  Italy,  Germany  and  other  countries  and  the 
majority  of  the  French  Socialist  Party.  The  Communist 
International  has  now  a  membership  of  2,800,000  in 
fifty-one  countries,1  publishing  656  dailies  and  425  other 
periodicals. 

Turning  from  the  political  to  the  industrial  side  of  labor 
organization,  the  largest  body  of  workers  is  found  in  the 
International  Federation  of  Trade  Unions  organized  in 
1901,  and  reorganized  in  1919.  The  permanent  secretariat 
is  located  in  Amsterdam.  It  stands  for  international  labor 
legislation,  modification  of  the  League  of  Nations,  inter¬ 
national  control  and  distribution  of  raw  materials,  and 
international  strike  action  against  war.  The  growth  of  the 
membership  of  the  I.  F.  T.  U.  has  been  as  follows: 


1904  .  2,477,077 

1914  .  6,843,909 

1919 .  23,170,006 


At  the  beginning  of  1923  there  were  19,650,280  members 
in  affiliation,  including  all  the  principal  countries,  save  the 
revolutionary  movement  of  Russia  on  the  left  and  that  of 
America  on  the  extreme  right. 

The  remarkable  growth  of  the  Trade  Union  Movement 
throughout  the  world  during  and  after  the  war  was  phe¬ 
nomenal.  In  the  thirty  principal  industrial  countries  the 
total  number  in  organized  trade  unions  rose  from  16,152,000 
in  1913  to  48,029,000  in  1920,  or  an  increase  of  approxi¬ 
mately  300  per  cent.  With  their  families,  organized  labor 
represents  about  half  the  population  of  Europe. 

The  growth  of  organized  labor  in  the  principal  countries 
was  as  follows:2 

1  Labor  International  Year  Book,  1923,  p.  67.  For  a  fuller  description  see  “The 
Two  Internationals,”  by  R.  P.  Dutt,  Labor  Research  Department,  London. 

*  International  Labor  Review,  Vol.  Ill,  July,  1921,  p.  79. 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


167 


1913 

1920 

Germany . 

.  4,513,000 

13,000,000 

United  Kingdom . 

.  4,173,000 

8,024,000 

Russia . 

* 

5,220,000 

United  States . 

.  2,722,000 

5,179,000 

France . 

.  1,027,000 

2,500,000 

Italy . 

.  972,000 

3,100,000 

Czecho-Slovakia . 

* 

2,000,000 

Australia . 

.  498,000 

684,000 

Belgium . 

.  200,000 

920,000 

Netherlands . 

.  189,000 

683,000 

Canada . 

.  176,000 

374,000 

Japan . 

* 

247,000 

Denmark . 

.  152,000 

400,000 

Sweden . 

.  136,000 

400,000 

Spain . 

* 

876,000 

India . 

* 

500,000 

Hungary . 

.  115,000 

343,000 

Poland . 

* 

947,000 

Other  Nations . 

.  1,279,000 

2,632,000 

Total . 

. 16,152,000 

48,029,000 

*  No  figures  available. 

During  the  period  of  trade  depression  following  1920 
most  of  the  national  labor  movements  lost  ground  some¬ 
what,  except  in  Germany. 

The  three  principal  international  federations  of  trade 
unions  are:  The  International  Federation  of  Trade  Unions, 
Amsterdam,  with  a  membership  of  some  20,000,000;  The 
International  Federation  of  Red  Trade  Unions  of  Moscow, 
claiming  adherents  numbering  12,000,000,  about  half  of 
whom  are  in  Russia;  and  the  International  Federation  of 
Christian  Trade  Unions  with  some  3,000,000  members. 
The  difference  between  the  three  is  political.  The  Amster¬ 
dam  International  stands  for  the  socialization  of  the  means 
of  production,  distribution  and  exchange  through  practical 
education  of  the  workers  for  industrial  democracy.  The 
Moscow  International  advocates  the  dictatorship  of  the 
proletariat  by  violent  revolution.  The  Christian  Inter- 


168 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


national  opposes  class  warfare,  and  stands  for  social  jus¬ 
tice,  with  a  closer  co-operation  between  capital  and  labor. 

A  long  fight  of  many  decades  has  been  made  for  inter¬ 
national  action  to  improve  labor  conditions.  As  early  as 
1818  the  enlightened  employer,  Robert  Owen,  had  pleaded 
with  the  statesmen  of  Europe  at  the  Congress  at  Aix-la- 
Chapelle  for  the  limitation  of  hours  of  labor  and  improve¬ 
ment  of  conditions  by  international  action,  but  decades  had 
to  pass  before  the  awakening  of  a  world  conscience  and  an 
international  mind  on  these  matters.  The  Swiss  Govern¬ 
ment  endeavored  for  a  decade  following  1881  to  enlist  the 
interest  of  other  governments  in  labor  questions.  Finally 
in  1890  the  efforts  of  the  Swiss  Government  resulted  in  the 
first  international  conference  at  Berlin.  A  series  of  further 
conferences  resulted,  in  1900,  in  forming  at  Paris  the  Inter¬ 
national  Association  for  the  Legal  Protection  of  Labor, 
after  a  quarter  of  a  century  of  effort. 

Up  to  the  outbreak  of  the  war  in*  1914  there  was  prac¬ 
tically  no  international  law  of  labor.1  A  great  step  in 
advance  was  taken  at  the  Peace  Conference  in  Paris  in 
1919  fraught  with  deep  significance  for  the  future.  For  the 
first  time  in  the  world’s  history  an  international  code  of 
labor  was  drawn  up,  “laying  down  general  principles  of 
labor  protection,  establishing  a  permanent  international 
organization  for  promoting  world-wide  adoption  of  protec¬ 
tive  standards,  and  arranging  for  the  first  official  annual 
International  Labor  Conference  at  Washington,  in  October, 
1919.” 

The  International  Labor  Organization  of  the  League  of 

1  While  full  credit  should  be  given  to  the  previous  efforts  of  the  International 
Association  for  the  Legal  Protection  of  Labor,  as  a  voluntary  organization  its  procedure 
was  necessarily  cumbersome  and  slow.  The  Peace  Conference  established  a  permanent 
effective  organization  equipped  with  machinery  and  power  to  accomplish  more  rapidly 
and  extc  nsively  the  work  so  nobly  begun  by  the  older  voluntary  association. 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


169 


Nations  was  formed  in  accordance  with  Article  23  of  the 
Covenant  which  agrees  that  members  of  the  League  “will 
endeavour  to  secure  and  maintain  fair  and  humane  con¬ 
ditions  of  labour  for  men,  women,  and  children,  both  in 
their  own  countries  and  in  all  countries  to  which  their  com¬ 
mercial  and  industrial  relations  extend.”  Fifty-four  states 
already  belong  to  the  organization,  including  all  members 
of  the  League  of  Nations  and  Germany.  America  and 
Russia  are  the  only  great  countries  still  outside. 

The  Treaty  of  Versailles  proclaims  that  there  exist  con¬ 
ditions  of  labor  “involving  such  injustices,  hardship  and 
privation  to  large  numbers  of  people,  as  to  produce  unrest 
so  great  that  the  peace  and  harmony  of  the  world  are  im¬ 
periled.”  The  Treaty  stands  for  certain  principles  which 
mark  the  growth  of  an  international  conscience  on  labor 
conditions.  Among  these  are  “The  right  of  association  for 
all  lawful  purposes  by  the  employed  as  well  as  by  the  em¬ 
ployers,  the  payment  to  the  employed  of  a  wage  adequate 
to  maintain  a  reasonable  standard  of  life,  the  adoption  of 
an  eight-hour  day  or  a  forty-eight-hour  week,  a  weekly 
rest  of  at  least  twenty-four  hours,  the  abolition  of  child 
labor,  and  equitable  economic  treatment  of  all  workers.” 

The  functions  of  the  International  Labor  Organization  at 
Geneva,  as  defined  in  Part  XIII  of  the  Treaty,  are  twofold: 
It  seeks  first  to  secure  uniformity  of  labor  legislation  by 
international  agreement  so  that  countries  with  enlightened 
labor  legislation  can  be  protected  from  the  unfair  com¬ 
petition  of  sweated  labor.  Secondly,  it  collects  and  dis¬ 
tributes  information  on  industrial  and  labor  conditions 
throughout  the  world  as  a  world  clearing  house  of  authori¬ 
tative  information.  The  International  Labor  Office  at 
Geneva  is  becoming  a  functioning  world  center  for  labor 
information  and  legislation.  The  writer  was  deeply  im- 


170 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


pressed  with  the  actual  work  of  the  Labor  Office.1  The 
Staff  comprises  men  and  women  of  twenty-eight  different 
nations.  The  Office  publishes  a  most  valuable  monthly, 
The  International  Labor  Review,  containing  world  informa¬ 
tion  on  labor  and  industry  of  interest  to  employers,  workers 
and  governments;  also  a  weekly  Industrial  Labor  Informa¬ 
tion  and  Official  Bulletin. 

At  least  once  a  year  the  Labor  Office  calls  a  Conference 
attended  by  representatives  of  the  fifty-four  states  belong¬ 
ing  to  the  organization.2  Each  state  is  represented  by  four 
delegates,  two  representing  the  government,  one  the  em¬ 
ployers  and  one  the  workers  of  each  country. 

Already  the  International  Labor  Organization  has 
achieved  notable  success.  It  has  secured  73  ratifications 
of  Draft  Conventions;  85  other  ratifications  have  been 

1  The  Director,  Mr.  Albert  Thomas,  is  the  well  known  former  Minister  of  Munitions 
in  the  French  War  Cabinet.  The  work  of  the  organization  is  divided  in  three  parts: 
The  Diplomatic  Division  organizes  the  annual  Conference  and  carries  on  official 
correspondence  with  governments  regarding  their  labor  standards  and  legislation; 
the  Intelligence  Division  collects  and  distributes  labor  information;  the  Research 
Division  conducts  scientific  studies  and  enquiries.  Attached  to  these  three  divisions 
are  nine  Technical  Sections  composed  of  trained  experts  devoted  to  the  special  study 
of  questions  relating  to  Unemployment,  Agriculture,  Industrial  Hygiene,  Safety, 
Russian  Affairs,  Maritime  Affairs,  Disablement,  Industrial  Relations  and  Co-operation. 

The  International  Labor  Office  is  the  executive  body  and  functions  under  the 
control  of  the  Governing  Body,  which  meets  normally  every  three  months,  and  is 
composed  of  twelve  representatives  of  the  Government,  six  delegates  representing  the 
Employers,  six  delegates  representing  the  Workers.  Although  the  International 
Labor  Organization  is  a  part  of  the  machinery  of  the  League  of  Nations  and  is  finanoed 
through  it,  it  is  in  large  measure  an  autonomous  organization  with  its  own  executive 
and  deliberative  organs  and  with  wide  powers  of  initiative. 

2  “When  the  Conference  has  decided  on  the  adoption  of  proposals  with  regard  to 
an  item  in  the  agenda,  it  will  rest  with  the  Conference  to  determine  whether  these 
proposals  should  take  the  form:  (a)  of  a  recommendation  to  be  submitted  to  the  Mem¬ 
bers  for  consideration  with  a  view  to  effect  being  given  to  it  by  national  legislation 
or  otherwise,  or  (b)  of  a  draft  international  convention  for  ratification  by  the  Members. 
In  either  case  a  majority  of  two-thirds  of  the  votes  cast  by  the  Delegates  present  is 
necessary. 

“Each  of  the  Members  undertakes  that  it  will,  within  the  period  of  one  year  at  most 
from  the  closing  of  the  session  of  the  Conference,  .  .  .  bring  the  recommendation 
or  draft  convention  before  the  authority  or  authorities  within  whose  competence  the 
matter  lies,  for  the  enactment  of  legislation  or  other  action.” 

Constitution  and  Rules,  International  Labor  Office,  1923,  p.  10. 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


171 


recommended  by  governments;  94  measures  have  been 
adopted  by  legislative  authorities,  and  96  others  are  being 
considered  by  different  parliaments.  Twenty-one  coun¬ 
tries  have  already  ratified  important  Draft  Conventions 
adopted  at  Washington.  Eleven  countries  have  already 
taken  action  on  night  work  for  women. 

The  writer  was  struck  by  the  effect  of  the  International 
Labor  Organization  and  the  work  of  the  Annual  Confer¬ 
ence  upon  labor  legislation  and  conditions  in  such  coun¬ 
tries  as  India.  He  heard  the  debates  in  the  Council  of 
State  at  Delhi  showing  the  deep  influence  of  the  League 
and  the  Labor  Organization  there.  India  has  already  re¬ 
duced  its  working  week  from  72  to  60  hours,  raised  its  age 
limit  for  workers  from  9  to  12  years;  adopted  a  new 
Factories  Act  and  a  Mines  Act. 

Under  the  influence  of  the  International  Labor  Or¬ 
ganization  China,  as  we  have  seen,  has  taken  the  first 
steps  for  the  regulation  of  labor  conditions;  and  has  been 
asked  to  adopt  the  principle  of  a  10-hour  working  day, 
and  an  8-hour  day  for  workers  under  fifteen  years  of  age. 

The  Labor  Office  is  now  conducting  an  investigation 
of  the  appalling  conditions  which  obtain  in  some  of  the 
mandated  territories  of  the  League  dealing  with  forced 
labor,  slavery  and  other  abominations.  The  searchlight  of 
the  world’s  public  opinion  will  now  be  turned  on  the  dark 
quarters  of  the  earth.  It  is  a  new  world  of  labor  which 
backward  countries  must  now  face  and  the  scorching  sun¬ 
light  of  world  publicity. 

Time  may  show  that  the  war  and  the  Peace  Treaty 
marked  the  beginning  of  a  new  era.  While  the  Treaty  was 
in  part  an  instrument  of  vengeance,  breaking  most  of  the 
fourteen  points,  it  nevertheless  embodied  two  great  ideals: 
The  one  was  the  Convenant  of  the  League  of  Nations. 
For  the  first  time  in  history  fifty-two  of  the  principal 


172 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


nations  of  the  world  were  able  to  unite  and  function  in  a 
growing  co-operative  commonwealth  of  nations  to  prevent 
war  and,  in  time,  to  endeavor  to  construct  a  new  world  of 
peace.  We  are  aware  of  its  faults  and  failures,  of  the 
strain  to  which  the  present  policy  of  France  is  subjecting 
it,  and  of  its  being  weakened  by  the  withdrawal  of  America 
from  her  responsibilities  and  her  moral  leadership,  though 
not  from  her  enormous  financial  gain  at  the  expense  of  im¬ 
poverished  Europe.  Yet  in  the  most  difficult  and  critical 
period  of  history,  within  three  years  this  co-operative  com¬ 
monwealth  of  fifty-two  nations  has  averted  four  wars, 
saved  Austria,  determined  the  boundary  of  Upper  Silesia, 
saved  Albania  from  invasion,  settled  the  contention  of 
Finland  and  Sweden  over  the  Aaland  Islands,  and  the  dis¬ 
putes  between  Poland  and  Lithuania,  Hungary  and  Czecho¬ 
slovakia,  Bulgaria  and  her  neighbors. 

It  has  established  the  world’s  first  Permanent  Court  of 
International  Justice.  It  has  registered  and  published 
over  four  hundred  treaties  in  its  cumulative  protest  against 
secret  diplomacy.  It  has  conducted  a  growingly  significant 
series  of  world  conferences  on  Opium,  Traffic  in  Women 
and  Children,  Finance  and  Reconstruction,  Communica¬ 
tion,  Disarmament  and  International  Health.  It  is  the 
boldest  venture  in  political  and  international  idealism 
that  the  world  has  ever  made.  Time  alone  can  vindicate  it. 

The  other  great  idealism  embodied  in  the  Treaty  was 
in  the  Labor  Section  which  sets  a  new  international  stand¬ 
ard  before  the  world.  This  has  already  been  embodied  in 
a  new  epoch  of  labor  legislation.  The  decade  from  1913 
to  1923  has  probably  produced  more  beneficent  legislation 
than  all  previous  history  combined.1 

1  The  great  gains  in  labor  legislation  were  notable  in  five  directions:  1.  The  regula¬ 
tion  of  conditions  of  employment  and  protection  of  women  and  children  in  industry. 
2.  The  limitation  of  hours  of  employment  for  all  classes.  3.  The  fixing  of  minimura 
rates  of  wages  for  badly  paid  industries.  4.  The  development  of  social  insurance 


LABOR  IN  EUROPE 


173 


A  new  conscience  is  being  created  with  regard  to  the 
age-long  exploitation  of  women  and  children.  Altogether 
forty-five  countries  have  established  a  minimum  age  of 
fourteen  years  or  more  for  work  in  factories.* 1  A  move¬ 
ment  to  reduce  hours  of  labor  became  almost  world-wide 
after  the  armistice  and  an  8-hour  day  law  was  passed  in 
many  countries.  We  realize  the  significance  of  this 
achievement  only  in  the  light  of  a  sixteen-hour  day  that 
obtained  in  many  instances  in  England  a  century  ago  and 
which  is  still  found  in  parts  of  Asia  today. 

A  new  day  of  internationalism  has  dawned,  though  many 
eyes  are  still  closed  to  the  light.  Forces  of  bigoted  and 
exclusive  nationalism,  regardless  of  the  welfare  of  labor, 
of  other  nations  and  of  humanity  as  a  whole,  reactionary 
agencies  like  fascism  and  the  Ku  Klux  Klan  movement 
may  long  oppose  all  claims  to  equal  justice  of  men  of  other 
nations,  races  and  classes  than  their  own,  but  humanity 
as  a  whole  cannot  be  deprived  of  its  birthright. 

For  twenty  centuries  every  advance  from  slavery,  serf¬ 
dom  and  poverty  has  been  fought  and  bitterly  resisted. 
Has  not  the  time  come  for  all  enlightened  men  to  unite  in 
the  crusade  that  is  now  needed  to  carry  forward  national 
and  international  legislation  and  action  for  a  new  world 
of  labor? 

against  accident,  sickness,  old  age  and  unemployment.  5.  The  new  development  in 
international  legislation,  for  the  first  time  in  history  fixing  new  international  standards 
of  labor. 

1  Internationl  Labor  Review,  July-August,  1921,  pp.  3-25. 


Chapter  VIII 

AMERICAN  LABOR  PROBLEMS 

The  American  Labor  Movement  has  been  a  natural, 
evolutionary  and  inevitable  development  of  the  workers 
in  self-protection  against  the  encroachment  of  the  in¬ 
dustrial  system  upon  human  life.  The  very  existence  of 
the  United  States  as  an  independent  nation  originated  in 
collective  action  over  a  trade  dispute.  During  the  colonial 
period  Great  Britain  had  sought  to  develop  and  retain  her 
own  industries  and  to  make  the  colonies  an  agricultural 
base  for  the  supply  of  raw  materials;  but  following  Amer¬ 
ican  independence  in  1789  there  was  a  marked  development 
of  industry  in  the  States.  The  trade  unions  came  into 
being  for  the  purpose  of  collective  bargaining  to  protect 
individual  workers  against  the  heavy  handicaps  to  which 
they  were  subjected  under  the  industrial  revolution.  With 
the  introduction  of  cheap  foreign  goods  the  workers  had  to 
meet  the  increasing  pressure  of  low  wages. 

The  labor  organizations  in  the  American  colonies  in  the 
seventeenth  century  had  been  mere  friendly  and  benevolent 
societies,  or  craft  guilds  of  workmen.  The  first  organiza¬ 
tion  of  workers  of  a  single  trade  and  the  first  recorded 
strike  occurred  in  1786  among  the  printers  in  Philadelphia 
who  went  on  strike  for  a  minimum  wage  of  $6.00  a  week.1 
The  first  cases  of  collective  bargaining  occurred  among 
the  Philadelphia  cordwainers  in  1799  and  the  New  York 
printers  in  1809.  Thus  “the  nineteenth  century  opened 

1 J.  R.  Commons,  “History  of  Labor,”  Vol.  I,  p.  25. 

174 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


175 


with  the  principle  of  collective  bargaining  well  understood 
in  labor  and  employing  circles  and  frequently  applied  in 
trade  disputes.”  We  find  the  masters  combining  during 
the  same  period  and  in  their  attitude  to  the  workers’  or¬ 
ganizations  they  endeavored  “to  break  them  up  altogether, 
root  and  branch.”1  Even  before  1800  we  find  instances  of 
the  punishment  of  scabs  or  strikebreakers,  the  use  of  the 
boycott  and  closed  shop  to  protect  apprentices  and  laborers. 
Within  ten  years  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  in 
1776  the  Philadelphia  printers  had  provided  a  strike  fund.2 
The  walking  delegate  began  his  rounds  to  consult  the 
masters  on  a  common  wage  scale  in  1799  and  1800,  for  the 
Philadelphia  shoemakers  and  the  Franklin  Typographical 
Society  of  New  York.  Contests  between  employers  and 
workers  in  the  courts  had  already  begun  in  Philadelphia, 
New  York  and  Pittsburgh  between  1806  and  1814. 

The  organized  labor  movement  in  the  United  States  may 
be  said  to  have  begun  with  the  union  of  wage  earners  of 
various  trades  in  Philadelphia  in  1827.3  The  carpenters 
had  gone  on  strike  for  a  ten-hour  day  and  the  other  or¬ 
ganized  workmen  of  the  city  rallied  to  their  support  to 
prevent  a  “depreciation  of  the  intrinsic  value  of  human 
labor  .  .  .  establishing  a  just  balance  of  power,  both 
mental,  moral,  political  and  scientific  between  all  the 
various  classes  and  individuals  which  constitute  society  at 
large.”4 

The  following  year  marked  the  entrance  of  the  “Me- 


i  Ibid.,  pp.  119-126. 

s  Watkins,  “Labor  Problems,”  pp.  123,  126. 

*  Craft  unions  were  organized  among  the  Shoemakers  of  Philadelphia,  1792;  the 
printers  of  New  York,  1794;  the  carpenters  of  Philadelphia,  1791;  the  Baltimore  tailors, 
1795,  etc. 

Watkins,  “Labor  Problems,”  pp.  2,  340. 

‘Commons,  “History  of  Labor,”  Vol.  I,  pp.  15,  190. 


176 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


chanics’  Union”  of  Philadelphia  into  politics,  by  the  elec¬ 
tion  of  a  number  of  labor  candidates  on  the  city  council 
and  state  legislature  to  “represent  the  interest  of  the  work¬ 
ing  classes.”  This  example  was  followed  successfully  in 
other  cities.  Soon  there  were  local  labor  parties  in  fifteen 
states  and  at  least  fifty  labor  papers  were  established.1 

The  workers  demanded  a  ten-hour  day,  the  restriction 
of  child  labor,  the  abolition  of  sweat  shops  and  many  of 
the  rights  for  which  labor  is  still  contending  today  after 
a  century  of  effort.  Partly  to  the  agitation  of  organized 
labor  a  century  ago,  we  owe  the  beginning  of  our  public 
school  system.2  As  in  the  British  movement,  labor  looked 
on  education  as  the  hope  of  the  workingman.  The  first 
report  at  a  convention  of  workingmen  in  New  England 
showed  1,600  out  of  4,000  factory  hands  were  children 
from  six  to  sixteen  years  of  age,  not  allowed  to  go  to 
school  and  compelled  to  work  fourteen  hours  a  day. 

By  1836  there  were  already  some  300,000  organized 
workers  in  the  seaboard  cities.  In  spite  of  systematic 
efforts  to  crush  the  unions  from  1829  to  1842  the  move¬ 
ment  not  only  spread  but  single  trades  began  to  organize 
on  a  national  scale. 

During  the  second  quarter  of  the  nineteenth  century 
from  1827  to  1850  labor  became  a  significant  factor  in 
the  United  States.  Craft  unions  began  to  combine  in 
inter-trade  associations  and  the  National  Trades  Union 
held  its  first  annual  convention  in  1834.  The  failure  of 
labor’s  ventures  in  political  action  and  the  bankruptcy  of 
the  unions  in  the  depression  following  the  panic  of  1837 
led  t q  a  decade  of  experiments  in  humanitarian  utopias, 
socialism  and  co-operative  communities.  Reformers,  phil- 


1  M.  Beard,  "Short  History  of  American  Labor  Movement,”  pp.  36,  37,  40. 

2  Commons,  "History  of  Labor  in  the  United  States,”  Vol.  I,  pp.  170,  184,  224. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


177 


anthropists  and  intellectuals  like  Horace  Greeley,  John  G. 
Whittier  and  Robert  Dale  Owen  worked  for  the  ameliora¬ 
tion  of  the  lot  of  the  workers. 

American  workingmen,  however,  have  never  been  greatly 
attracted  by  what  they  considered  impractical  idealism  or 
utopian  socialistic  ventures.  With  their  pragmatic  and 
practical  habit  they  soon  returned  to  the  revival  of  craft 
unionism  and  the  immediate  improvement  of  their  wages, 
hours  and  conditions  of  work.  Following  the  Civil  War 
not  less  than  thirty-two  national  unions  were  established 
before  1870. 

The  Knights  of  Labor  organized  as  a  national  amal¬ 
gamation  in  a  highly  centralized  movement  in  1869. 
Gradually  the  movement  became  idealistic,  political  and 
impractical.  It  aimed  to  unite  all  workers,  skilled  and 
unskilled,  in  one  centralized  class  organization.  Its  mem¬ 
bership  exceeded  700,000  in  1886,  yet  by  1900  it  became 
practically  extinct.  Its  failure  may  be  traced  to  its  being 
involved  in  costly  strikes,  its  artificial  theory  of  the  iden¬ 
tity  of  interest  of  all  workers,  its  mixed  composition,  its 
political  entanglements,  its  over-centralization  and  its 
impractical  idealism.  It  failed  because  it  rested  upon  false 
assumptions  and  was  contrary  to  the  reality  of  modern 
industrial  forces.1 

The  American  Federation  of  Labor  was  founded  in  1886, 
at  the  height  of  the  activity  of  the  Knights  of  Labor,  with 
Samuel  Gompers  as  President.  It  turned  from  utopias  to 
the  vigorous  prosecution  of  labor’s  immediate  practical 
ends.  It  was  founded  on  the  autonomy  of  craft  unions 
united  in  a  loose  federation. 

The  craft  union  unites  workers  engaged  in  a  single  occu¬ 
pation,  organized  both  locally  and  nationally.  The  Indus - 


1  Professor  Hoxie,  “Trade  Unionism  in  the  United  States,”  p.  93. 


178 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


trial  union  seeks  to  unite  all  workers,  skilled  or  unskilled, 
of  all  departments  or  crafts  engaged  in  one  industry  like 
the  United  Mine  Workers  of  America.  The  trades  union 
federates  unions  of  different  crafts  and  industries  in  a  city, 
state,  national  or  international  federation.  Thus  the  Chi¬ 
cago  Federation  of  Labor,  the  Illinois  Federation  of  Labor 
and  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  unite  workers  of  all 
crafts  and  industries. 

The  American  Federation  of  Labor  began  with  its  chief 
emphasis  upon  craft  unionism,  but  has  developed  toward 
industrial  unionism.  Its  growth  was  steady  and  normal 
from  584,321  in  1900  to  4,079,740  in  1920.1  It  suffered  a 
slight  decrease  in  the  years  of  depression  that  followed. 
The  American  Federation  belongs  to  the  right  wing  of 
labor,  being  perhaps  the  most  conservative  of  all  large 
labor  movements  of  the  world.  While  the  Russians  have 
turned  to  Communism,  the  Latin  nations  to  Syndicalism, 
the  Germans  to  Marxian  State  Socialism,  the  British  to 
political,  constitutional,  Fabian  tactics  for  a  new  social 
order,  the  American  Labor  Movement  has  refused  all  alli¬ 
ance  with  socialism  and  has  held  tenaciously  to  its  prac¬ 
tical  industrial  program. 

This  has  been  due  largely  to  the  leadership  of  Mr. 
Samuel  Gompers  as  President  from  1886  until  the  present 
time,  save  for  one  year.  He  has  refused  to  be  drawn  into 
radical  economic  theories,  and  has  stood  for  the  immediate 
practical  ends  of  an  eight-hour  day,  collective  bargaining 
and  protective  labor  legislation  under  the  present  capital¬ 
istic  system.  The  movement  has  been  one  of  the  great 

l  The  growth  of  the  A.  F.  of  L.  may  be  seen  in  the  following  table: 


1900 . 

.  584,321 

1914 . 

.  2,020,671 

1905 . 

.  1,494,300 

1919 . 

.  3,260,068 

1910 . 

.  1,562,112 

1920 . 

.  4,079,740 

Labour  International  Handbook,  1921,  p.  304. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  &QVEMENT 


179 


conservative  forces  in  national  life.  It  vigorously  sup¬ 
ported  the  Government  in  the  World  War. 

But  the  movement  has  also  had  its  failures.  In  thirty- 
seven  years  it  has  failed  to  organize  the  majority  of  the 
workers  in  America.  It  has  not  won  the  adherence  of  some 
of  the  strongest  unions  like  the  Railway  Brotherhoods,  the 
Amalgamated  Clothing  Workers,  etc.  It  has  not  been  able 
successfully  to  organize  the  workers  of  some  of  the  power¬ 
ful  corporations  and  trusts  like  the  United  States  Steel 
Corporation.  It  has  failed  to  reach  the  unskilled  workers 
who  have  been  so  successfully  organized  in  Great  Britain 
and  Germany.  It  has  not  met  the  problem  of  the 
14,000,000  foreigners  or  the  nearly  12,000,000  Negroes  in 
America.  It  has  been  accused  of  being  a  middle-class 
“aristocracy  of  labor,”  uniting  neither  with  the  needier 
workmen  of  America  nor  with  the  world’s  labor  movement, 
such  as  the  International  Federation  of  Trade  Unions  of 
Amsterdam  and  the  International  Labor  Organization  of 
Geneva.  It  faces  the  constant  desertion  of  the  best  brains 
of  the  movement  as  its  more  enterprising  and  successful 
leaders  rise  into  the  employing  class.  In  Europe  such  men 
usually  remain  the  loyal  leaders  of  their  less  fortunate 
fellow-workers;  in  America  they  seize  the  opportunity  to 
leave  the  ranks  of  labor  as  soon  as  they  can.  The  result 
is  that  the  American  movement  is  weakened  and  divided 
between  skilled  and  unskilled,  American  and  foreigner, 
white  and  black,  radical  and  conservative,  Federation  and 
non-Federation,  company  and  national  unions,  craft  and 
industrial  unions. 

The  Labor  Movement  in  America,  however,  faces  pecu¬ 
liar  difficulties  and  handicaps.  It  is  in  the  land  of  the 
greatest  stronghold  of  the  money  power  of  concentrated 
capitalism;  it  has  often  had  to  meet  the  powerful  oppo- 


180 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


sition  of  organized  employers;  it  is  scattered  over  a  vast 
diversified  continent;  it  has  found  the  agricultural  workers 
largely  conservative  and  inaccessible;  it  has  been  weakened 
by  the  competition,  lower  wage  and  living  standard  of  the 
Negro  and  immigrant  workman;  it  has  had  to  meet  in 
employers,  government  and  courts  a  philosophy  of  extreme 
individualism  and  laissez-faire  such  as  obtained  in  England 
in  the  latter  part  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

Outside  the  Federation  are  a  number  of  unions,  such  as 
the  powerful  four  Railway  Brotherhoods  of  engineers,  con¬ 
ductors,  firemen  and  trainmen,  the  strongest  and  most 
successful  independent  trade  or  craft  unions.  They  unite 
an  influential  body  of  skilled,  highly  paid  workers,  con¬ 
servative  and  exclusive,  emphasizing  the  methods  of  co¬ 
operation  and  arbitration  and  avoiding  strikes  as  far  as 
possible.  They  hold  a  middle-class  viewpoint  rather  than 
making  common  cause  with  labor  as  a  whole.  They  have 
been  fortunate  in  the  leadership  of  such  men  as  Warren  S. 
Stone.  They  have  large  financial  reserves,  a  successful 
co-operative  bank  of  their  own  and  enormous  bargaining 
power.  The  Amalgamated  Clothing  Workers,  organized  in 
1914,  is  another  independent  and  successful  union.  They 
have  their  research,  educational  and  publicity  departments, 
with  papers  published  in  seven  languages.  Instead  of  the 
old  system  of  ^ar  and  spies,  we  have  in  the  clothing  indus¬ 
try  the  successful  operation  of  an  agreement  between  the 
Amalgamated  and  the  employees,  with  a  written  constitu¬ 
tion  providing  for  executive,  legislative  and  judicial  func¬ 
tions,  fulfilled  in  mutual  good-will  for  the  common  benefit 
of  the  employers,  the  employees  and  the  community.  Here 
is  a  “new  model”  for  constitutionalized  industry  that  may 
yet  be  followed  in  other  branches  of  trade. 

The  Industrial  Workers  of  the  World,  organized  in  1905 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


181 


in  opposition  to  the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  is 
the  representative  of  syndicalist,  revolutionary  industrial 
unionism.1  It  is  class  conscious,  as  the  Federation  is  craft 
conscious.  It  stands  for  the  abolition  of  capitalism  and 
the  control  of  industry  by  the  workers.  It  advocates  “one 
big  union”  of  all  workers.  It  stands  for  the  class  struggle, 
the  general  strike,  sabotage,  the  boycott  and  the  substi¬ 
tution  of  industrial  communism  for  the  present  system  of 
private  property.  Such  movements  are  common  in  all 
countries  in  Europe.  They  are  least  dangerous  and  make 
the  least  appeal  in  countries  like  England,  where  freedom 
of  speech,  justice  and  widespread  education  render  them 
innocuous. 

The  American  I.  W.  W.  is  composed  chiefly  of  the 
poorest  lumber  workers  of  the  Northwest,  the  mine  workers 
of  the  Rocky  Mountain  region,  and  migratory  agricultural 
workers.  Before  judging  its  misguided  radicalism  it  would 
be  well  to  study  the  terrible  working  conditions  that  pro¬ 
duced  this  movement.2  The  organization  and  many  of  its 
members  have  been  subjected  to  fierce  persecution  with 
wholesale  raids,  imprisonment  and  in  some  cases  illegal 
violence  and  lynching.  Its  membership  includes  a  consider¬ 
able  group  of  intellectuals,  philosophic,  Sorel  syndicalists 
who  were  once  reformers  but  who  now  see  no  way  of  chang¬ 
ing  the  present  order  except  by  syndicalist  tactics. 

The  strength  of  the  organization  has  been  greatly  over¬ 
estimated.  At  the  beginning  of  the  war  the  paid-up  mem¬ 
bership  was  only  14,310,  and  100,000  membership  cards 
were  held.  The  I.  W.  W.  has  never  been  able  to  develop 

1  Its  preamble  declares,  “The  working  class  and  the  employing  class  have  nothing 
in  common.  Between  these  two  classes  a  struggle  must  go  on  until  the  workers  of  the 
world  organize  as  a  class,  take  possession  of  the  earth  and  of  the  machinery  of  produc¬ 
tion,  and  abolish  the  wage  system.” 

2  See  writings  of  Professor  Carlton  Parker,  “An  American  Idyll,”  by  Mrs.  Parker, 
The  American  Labor  Year  Book,  1919-1920,  p.  100;  1921-1922,  pp.  24,  151. 


182 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


strong  leaders  or  a  stable  membership,  but  has  associated 
the  most  desperate  elements  from  underpaid,  under¬ 
nourished,  unskilled  workmen.  Syndicalism  as  a  “doctrine 
of  despair”  will  not  appeal  to  well-paid  American  work¬ 
men.  But  it  is  for  America  to  see  that  conditions  are  not 
permitted  that  drive  men  to  despair. 

The  total  membership  in  all  trade  unions  in  the  United 
States  rose  after  the  war  to  approximately  6,000,000,  or 
double  the  number  in  1903.  With  their  families  this  repre¬ 
sents  about  thirty  millions,  or  over  one-fourth  of  the 
population.* 1 

The  American  Federation  of  Labor,  unlike  the  trade 
union  movements  of  Europe,  has  been  opposed  to  any  alli¬ 
ance  with  socialism  and  has  refused  to  form  a  political 
labor  party.  New  tendencies  have,  however,  appeared  in 
recent  years  in  the  movement.  The  Montreal  Convention 
in  1920,  despite  Mr.  Gompers’  opposition,  adopted  a  reso¬ 
lution  for  “government  ownership  and  democratic  control” 
of  the  railroads,  by  29,159  votes  to  8,349. 

The  Plumb  Plan  proposed  for  the  operation  of  the  rail¬ 
roads  is  somewhat  similar  to  that  suggested  for  the  working 
of  the  mines  of  Great  Britain  by  the  Government  Sankey 
Commission.  Mr.  Plumb,  former  railroad  corporation  law¬ 
yer  and  late  attorney  for  the  Railroad  Brotherhoods, 
advocated  government  purchase  and  ownership,  with  the 
operation  of  the  roads  by  a  board  of  fifteen  directors;  five 
to  represent  the  public,  appointed  by  the  President  with 
the  approval  of  the  Senate;  five  elected  by  the  operating 
officers  of  the  road;  and  five  by  the  employees.  The  board 


Per  cent 

1  Gainfully  employed  in  United  States .  41,609,192  50.3 

(50  3  per  cent  of  population  over  10  years  of  age) 

Gainfully  employed  in  manufacturing .  12,812,701  30.8 

Gainfully  employed  in  agriculture .  10,951,074  26.3 

U.  S.  Census,  1920. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


183 


of  directors,  officers  and  employees  would  constitute  the 
operating  corporation,  which  would  lease  the  roads  from 
the  government  for  a  hundred  years,  subject  to  recall  by 
Congress.  On  January  1,  1920,  Mr.  Plumb  proposed  the 
extension  of  this  plan  to  public  service  corporations,  the 
exploitation  of  natural  resources,  and  industries  based  upon 
monopoly  grants  and  privileges  under  the  tri-partite  repre¬ 
sentation  of  the  public,  private  capital  and  labor.1 

Recent  conventions  show  the  trend  of  the  A.  F.  of  L.  to 
become  more  progressive  and  to  break  with  the  individual¬ 
ist  and  opportunist  traditional  policy  of  Mr.  Gompers.  The 
old  guard  under  Mr.  Gompers  has  shown  distrust  of  state 
control  in  its  opposition  to  unemployment  and  health  insur¬ 
ance,  old-age  pensions  and  similar  measures.  The  younger 
and  more  progressive  element  stands  for  the  promotion  of 
industrial  as  opposed  to  craft  unionism,  the  nationalization 
of  railroads  and  mines,  and  the  solidarity  of  labor.  Sev¬ 
eral  influences,  however,  tend  to  keep  the  A.  F.  of  L.  in 
conservative  channels,  such  as  the  self-perpetuating  char¬ 
acter  of  the  executive  committee,  the  fact  that  the  larger 
and  more  progressive  unions  have  no  more  representation  in 
the  annual  convention  than  the  small  unions,  and  the  per¬ 
sonal  influence  of  Mr.  Gompers  by  reason  of  his  past 
services  and  age. 

If  we  compare  the  American  Labor  Movement  as 
represented  by  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  with 
the  movements  in  Europe,  we  find  several  outstanding 
characteristics: 

1.  American  labor  on  the  whole  enjoys  the  benefits  of 
the  most  wealthy  and  prosperous  country ;  it  has  the  highest 


1  See  “Modern  Social  Movements,”  Zimand.pp.  107-112,  and  Plumb  Plan  League 
publications,  Machinist  Building,  Washington,  D.  C. 


184 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


wages  and  the  best  mechanical  appliances  in  the  world.1 
Compared  to  other  countries,  relatively  more  attention  has 
been  paid  in  America  to  the  mechanics  of  industry,  how¬ 
ever,  than  to  the  far  more  important  human  factor. 

2.  The  movement  has  been  prevailingly  pragmatic,  op¬ 
portunist  and  practical,  seeking  chiefly  the  improvement 
of  material  conditions.  It  has  not  been  concerned  with 
a  program  for  obtaining  a  new  social  order. 

3.  It  has  been  on  the  whole  non-political,  holding  rigidly 
to  its  industrial  program. 

4.  It  has  been  prevailingly  conservative,  individualistic, 
and,  in  its  official  attitude,  anti-socialist. 

5.  It  has  been  a  movement  largely  isolated  and  self- 
sufficient.  It  has  sought  no  alliance  with  the  intellectuals, 
as  in  Great  Britain  and  Europe.  It  has  held  prevailingly 
aloof  from  the  unskilled,  the  immigrant  and  the  Negro.  It 
has  withdrawn  from  making  common  cause  with  the  labor 
movement  of  the  rest  of  the  world. 

6.  Its  chief  lack  has  been  the  absence  of  a  practical 
idealism  that  seeks  some  ultimate  goal  of  a  new  social 
order,  based  on  underlying  principles  of  a  common  human¬ 
ity,  beyond  its  class  or  group. 


1  An  investigation  conducted  by  the  Manchester  Guardian  reveals  the  following 
comparative  table  of  Wages  in  America  and  Europe: 

Relative  real  value  of  workers'  remuneration  measured  by  its  power  to  purchase 
certain  articles  of  food  (Great  Britain — 100). 


Great  United 

Occupation  Britain  Germany  France  Belgium  States 

Bricklayer .  100  41  55  50  300 

Carpenter .  100  41  60  50  240 

Unskilled  labor .  100  62  58  51  86 

Average .  100  48  57.6  50.3  208.6 

Rates  of  Money  Wages  for  J+8  hours'  work,  April,  May,  1922. 

Occupation  United  States  Great  Britain  France  Germany 

Bricklayer .  $60.06  $19.54  $11.88  $3.48 

Carpenter .  54.00  19.54  15.26  3.48 

Unskilled  labor .  14.40  13.54  8.79  3.40 

Average .  42.83  17.54  11.976  3.45 


Manchester  Guardian,  Reconstruction  in  Europe,  October  26,  1922,  pp.  512-544. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


185 


The  American  Labor  Movement  is  based  too  largely 
upon  the  idea  of  force.  More  and  more  the  unions  seem 
to  distrust  or  abandon  when  they  can  the  method  of  arbi¬ 
tration,  as  in  the  recent  coal  strike.  Frequently  the  unions 
wait  until  their  power  exceeds  that  of  the  employers  and 
then  make  proposals  for  altering  conditions  in  the  mood 
of  ‘Take  it  or  leave  it.”  Thus  the  movement  is  often  anti- 
intellectualist.  It  not  only  keeps  intellectuals  out,  but  re¬ 
fuses  to  use  intellectual  means  for  gaining  its  ends.  There 
is  also  a  tendency  of  large  unions  to  go  on  strike  or  dis¬ 
regard  contracts  in  the  face  of  opposition  of  national  or 
international  officials.  If  the  international  officers  seek  by 
coercion  to  force  the  workers  to  accept  contracts  which  the 
workers  believe  to  be  unjust  it  can  only  lead  in  the  end 
to  separate  labor  movements  such  as  the  Amalgamated 
Clothing  Workers. 

The  reliance  upon  force  and  the  lack  of  integration  be¬ 
tween  local  and  international  unions  are  intellectual  and 
moral  problems,  and  since  right  conduct  is  discriminating 
conduct,  there  appears  to  be  but  one  avenue  of  escape, 
namely  education.  The  Labor  Movement  in  Great  Britain, 
as  we  have  seen,  long  ago  recognized  the  value  of  an 
educational  strategy  which  has  gained  but  tardy  recogni¬ 
tion  in  America.  It  is  less  than  a  year  since  the  American 
Federation  of  Labor  gave  sanction  to  the  program  of  the 
Workers’  Education  Bureau,  which  is  of  such  importance 
to  the  future  of  labor  in  this  country. 

The  only  bases  upon  which  labor  may  hope  to  share  in 
the  control  and  management  of  industry  are  intellectual 
and  moral.  The  use  of  other  methods  such  as  coercion  and 
force  tend  to  deprive  the  workers  of  all  desire  to  assume 
intellectual  and  moral  responsibilities.  In  short  American 
trade  union  startegy  tends  to  divorce  the  worker  from  his 
industry.  If  this  is  persisted  in  we  shall  be  obliged  to 


186 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


look  forward  to  a  continuing  conflict,  a  permanent  separa¬ 
tion  of  the  worker  from  all  sharing  in  the  control  of  in¬ 
dustry  which  he  enjoys  in  some  other  countries,  and  a 
divided  and  discredited,  instead  of  a  united  and  strong, 
industrial  organization. 

To  appreciate  the  difficulties  of  the  American  Labor 
Movement  let  us  consider  briefly  some  of  its  outstanding 
problems : 

1.  First  of  all  there  is  the  problem  of  backward  labor 
legislation.  Our  federal  labor  legislation  is  in  many  re¬ 
spects  far  behind  that  of  the  more  advanced  countries, 
while  that  of  the  forty-eight  states  lacks  uniformity  and 
standardization.  Our  various  states  are  found  in  compe¬ 
tition  and  even  conflict,  and  the  more  backward  tend  to 
drag  down  the  standards  of  living  of  the  more  advanced. 

For  more  than  a  century,  since  1802,  Great  Britain  has 
built  up  a  uniform  and  effective  body  of  legislation.  Un¬ 
employment  insurance,  workmen’s  compensation,  sickness 
insurance,  old-age  pensions,  trades-boards  acts  for  fixing 
minimum  wages,  and  a  remarkable  body  of  legislation  for 
the  protection  of  the  workers  and  social  welfare  has  been 
enacted.  Even  a  new  country  like  Czecho-Slovakia  has 
within  five  years  already  surpassed  in  some  respects  the 
federal  labor  legislation  of  the  United  States.  Up  to  the 
outbreak  of  the  war  we  were  considered  by  many  a  full 
generation  behind  the  more  advanced  countries  of  Europe. 

In  1910  our  position  before  the  world  in  labor  legislation 
was  disgraceful.1  Until  1916,  as  Professor  John  R.  Com¬ 
mons  points  out,  we  had  for  our  half  million  civil  employees 
“the  worst  compensation  law  in  the  world,”  without  any 
protection  for  their  invalidity  or  old  age.  There  was  no 
federal  legislation  against  child  labor  and  very  little  against 
excessive  hours  of  work.  Unlike  other  advanced  countries, 


i  Lowe,  “International  Protection  of  Labor,”  pp.  79-110. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


187 


we  had  no  unified  system  of  public  labor  exchange  offices. 
[We  were  not  providing  for  the  restoration  of  industrial 
cripples  or  for  universal  workmen’s  health  insurance.1  We 
had  been  among  the  most  backward  of  the  leading  nations 
in  taking  part  officially  in  the  internationl  regulation  of 
labor  conditions. 

The  last  seven  years  have  witnessed  a  great  advance  both 
in  federal  and  state  legislation,  but  our  situation,  especially 
in  the  backward  states,  is  still  humiliating.  Massachusetts 
as  early  as  1836  led  the  way  in  labor  legislation  and  in 
1869  established  the  first  governmental  labor  bureau  in 
the  world  for  the  study  of  labor  conditions. 

According  to  the  Census  of  1920,  1,060,850  children  from 
ten  to  fifteen  years  old  were  “engaged  in  gainful  occupa¬ 
tions,”  or  one-twelfth  of  the  total  number  of  children  of 
that  age,  and  large  numbers  employed  under  ten  were  not 
enumerated.2  Of  children  from  ten  to  fifteen,  13  per  cent 
in  Rhode  Island,  17  per  cent  in  the  East  South  Central 
States,  and  in  Georgia,  Alabama,  South  Carolina  and 
Mississippi  from  21  per  cent  to  over  one-quarter  of  the 
children  were  employed.  In  Louisiana  and  South  Dakota 
children  are  permitted  to  work  10  hours  a  day,  or  60  hours 
a  week,  and  in  North  and  South  Carolina  11  hours  a  day, 
compared  to  6  hours  a  day  in  India. 

To  prevent  this  unstandardized  conflict  in  state  laws,  a 
United  States  Child  Labor  Law  became  effective  Septem¬ 
ber  1,  1917.  On  June  3,  1918,  the  Supreme  Court  declared 
the  federal  statute  unconstitutional  by  a  vote  of  five  to 
four.  In  May,  1922,  the  second  Child  Labor  Law  Act  to 
protect  children  was  also  declared  unconstitutional.  Public 
opinion  was  aroused  against  these  two  decisions,  both  be¬ 
cause  of  the  conclusions  and  the  economic  reasoning  on 


i Comraons-Andrews,  “Principles  of  Labor  Legislation,”  p.  II. 

*  Fourteenth  Census,  Population  1920,  Occupation  of  Children,  p.  5. 


188 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


which  they  were  based.  After  decades  of  agitation  and 
preparation,  legislation  passed  by  the  representatives  of 
the  people  may  now  be  swept  aside  by  the  vote  of  one  or 
two  men,  who  are  often  drawn  from  a  class  unfriendly  to 
labor.  Many  persons  now  favor  a  majority  of  seven  or 
eight  in  the  Supreme  Court  in  order  to  nullify  legislation, 
together  with  a  Federal  Constitutional  amendment  to  per¬ 
mit  the  establishment  of  minimum  industrial  standards  by 
Federal  as  well  as  State  legislation. 

Thirty  of  our  forty-eight  states  still  have  laws  below 
the  modest  standards  of  the  first  and  second  federal  laws 
for  the  protection  of  child  labor,  which  were  declared  un¬ 
constitutional.  Thus,  in  some  areas  of  American  national 
life,  manhood,  womanhood  and  childhood  remain  unpro¬ 
tected  by  labor  legislation  where  they  are  safeguarded  in 
other  countries.  Here  is  one  handicap  and  problem  of 
American  labor  that  concerns  every  loyal  citizen. 

2.  The  second  problem  which  not  only  confronts  labor, 
but  which  involves  the  whole  question  of  industrial  rela¬ 
tionships,  is  class  'prejudice  and  the  difference  of  class 
viewpoint.  Society  is  divided  industrially  between  the 
two  principal  classes  of  employers  and  employed.  How¬ 
ever  much  we  may  deplore  it,  these  two  classes  live  in  two 
different  worlds  and  view  life  from  two  different  stand¬ 
points. 

According  to  the  late  Professor  Hoxie  of  the  University 
of  Chicago  the  viewpoint  of  employers’  associations,  espe¬ 
cially  those  of  the  militant  type,  is  that  of  the  doctrine 
of  natural  rights,  free  competition,  freedom  of  contract 
and  inviolable  property  rights.1  It  is  assumed  that  a 
harmony  of  interests  prevails  in  society  and  that  the  em¬ 
ployers’  interests  are  identical  with  the  interests  of  society, 
therefore  trade  unions  are  to  be  condemned  when  they 


1  Hoxie,  “  Trade  Unionism  in  the  United  States,”  pp.  195-252. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


189 


interfere  with  employers’  interests.  The  interests  of  the 
employers  and  workers  are  assumed  to  be  harmonious 
and  therefore  if  unions  oppose  the  employer  they  are  to  be 
condemned.  The  employer  gives  work  to  labor  and  can 
hire  and  fire  men  as  he  will.  He  has  a  right  to  manage  his 
own  business,  for  it  is  his.  It  is  further  assumed  that  free 
competition  is  always  in  the  interest  of  society  and  there¬ 
fore  the  employer  has  the  right  to  bargain  individually 
with  labor  and  to  refuse  to  bargain  collectively.  Further 
the  law,  the  courts  and  the  police  represent  the  absolute 
and  impartial  rights  of  justice.  All  the  above  rests  on  a 
social  philosophy  of  God-given,  inalienable,  absolute 
natural  rights  and  is  the  old  classical  individualistic 
laissez-faire  position  of  the  eighteenth  century.  It  seems 
to  the  employer  obvious  and  axiomatic. 

Mankind  has  progressed  socially,  however,  in  three 
stages,  from  the  individual  consciousness  of  the  seventeenth 
and  eighteenth  centuries;  to  the  group  consciousness  of  the 
nineteenth,  and  the  social  consciousness  of  the  twentieth 
century.  In  the  first  we  have  rampant  individualism,  in 
the  second,  group  power  and  control,  and  in  the  third  social 
control  in  the  interest,  not  of  the  favored  individual  or 
group,  but  of  the  welfare  of  all.  Under  this  third  stage  of 
development  a  new  philosophy  has  risen  in  the  modem 
world.  It  is  not  that  of  a  society  fixed,  final,  immutable 
and  absolute,  but  evolutionary.  In  this  evolving  social 
order,  institutions  and  laws  are  relative  to  the  conditions 
of  advancing  humanity  and  must  conform  to  the  welfare 
of  society.  Laws  and  institutions  tend  to  petrify  and  re¬ 
main  as  survivals  in  a  social  order  which  has  passed  beyond 
them. 

Professor  Hoxie  shows  that  our  present  laws  and  insti¬ 
tutions  were  conceived  in  the  stage  of  the  earlier  in¬ 
dividualistic  and  competitive  society  resting  upon  an 


190 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


absolutist  conception  of  fixed  social  relationships  and  of 
property  rights.  The  aim  of  law  becomes  insensibly  that 
of  preserving  these  rights  acquired  by  the  group  in  an 
earlier  age.  It  thus  may  become  individualistic  rather  than 
socialized,  for  individual  rights  rather  than  social  welfare, 
for  the  claims  of  private  property  rather  than  personal  and 
social  justice.  Law  may  thus  become  stiff,  inflexible,  un¬ 
progressive,  undemocratic  and  unjust,  until  finally  property 
rights  may  become  property  wrongs,  and  the  demands  of 
“justice”  for  the  favored  few  may  involve  injustice  for  the 
dispossessed  many.  Thus,  according  to  Professor  Watkins 
of  the  University  of  Illinois,  “American  courts  have  been 
condemned  as  antiquated  in  viewpoint  and  method,  basing 
their  decisions  on  logic  rather  than  on  the  current  facts  of 
economic  life;  individualistic  rather  than  socialized,  pro¬ 
tecting  property  rights  rather  than  personal  rights,  and 
exaggerating  private  right  at  the  expense  of  public  right 
and  welfare;  ultra-conservative,  basing  their  decisions  upon 
eighteenth  century  legal  philosophy,  and  failing  to  meet  the 
needs  of  a  changing  industrial  society.”1 

It  is  held  by  some  that  the  judge  can  do  no  wrong,  just 
as  it  was  once  claimed  that  the  king  enjoys  divine  right. 
Such  persons  would  probably  heartily  agree  with  the  de¬ 
cision  of  Justice  James  C.  Van  Siclen  of  the  Supreme  Court 
of  Brooklyn,  New  York,  who,  in  granting  an  injunction 
against  picketing  by  the  members  of  the  Amalgamated 
Clothing  Workers  of  America,  declared  that  in  the  contest 
between  capital  and  labor,  the  courts  must  stand  squarely 
with  the  former  group.  According  to  the  New  York  Times, 
his  statement  was  as  follows:  “They  (the  courts)  must 
stand  at  all  times  as  the  representatives  of  capital,  of  cap¬ 
tains  of  industry,  devoted  to  the  principle  of  individual 
initiative,  protect  property  and  persons  from  violence  and 


i  “Introduction  tu  tke  Study  of  Labor  Problems,”  p.  617. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


191 


destruction,  strongly  opposed  to  all  schemes  for  the  nation¬ 
alization  of  industry.”1  Men  of  this  class  will  fervently 
repeat  a  phrase  from  a  catechism  of  an  earlier  day:  “Laws 
are  wise  institutions  for  maintaining  the  rich  in  their  pos¬ 
sessions  and  restraining  the  vicious  poor.” 

As  opposed  to  the  above  conception  of  society,  labor  and 
the  progressive  thinkers  rest  upon  the  evolutionary  rather 
than  the  absolutist  philosophy,  upon  the  rights  of  persons 
as  paramount  to  those  of  property.  Labor  takes  its  stand 
against  autocracy  in  industry  as  well  as  in  government. 
It  believes  that  there  is  a  harmony  of  interest  between 
workers  and  that  they  owe  a  supreme  duty  to  one  another 
and  to  society  as  a  whole.  They  believe  that  they  give 
profits  to  the  employer  as  truly  as  the  employer  gives  work 
to  them;  that  it  is  necessary  for  the  welfare  of  the  mass  of 
labor  to  bargain  collectively  and  that  the  individual  worker 
without  capital,  tools  or  means  of  livelihood  is  utterly  help¬ 
less  before  the  employer  or  group  of  employers  who  possess 
an  overwhelming  advantage  over  him  as  an  isolated  indi¬ 
vidual.  They  believe  that  they  have  as  much  right  to 
representatives  of  their  own  choosing  within  or  without 
their  own  works  as  have  the  employers  to  utilize  the 
assistance  of  outside  employers  and  legal  counsel.  They 
believe  that  they  have  the  same  right  to  protect  the  stand¬ 
ards  of  their  class  as  a  whole  as  have  employers,  business 
or  professional  men. 

They  believe  that  while  a  selfish  individualist  philosophy 
may  claim  the  right  of  the  individual  laborer  to  work 
where,  when  and  for  whom  he  pleases  regardless  of  the 
welfare  of  his  fellows,  that  a  larger  view  of  social  relation¬ 
ships  and  obligations  in  an  organic  society  must  look  be¬ 
yond  the  isolated  action  of  the  individual  to  the  final  test 
of  social  well-being.  They  believe  that  the  ultimate  law  of 


1  The  American  Labor  Year  Book,  1921-22,  p.  69. 


192 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


life  is  not  that  of  Prussian  militarism,  of  a  brute  struggle 
for  life  in  merciless  competition,  for  the  survival  of  the 
selfish  individual,  but  of  co-operation  with  all  men  as 
brothers.  They  hold  that  love  is  creation’s  final  law,  and 
that  the  chief  end  of  each  is  the  full  sharing  of  life  with  all. 
They  may  not  always  realize  or  be  able  to  express  this 
philosophy,  but  a  real  idealism  and  a  real  philosophy  of 
life  underlies  this  movement  of  modern  labor  throughout 
the  world. 

A  related  problem  in  America  is  that  of  industrial  war¬ 
fare.  There  has  been  an  average  of  over  three  thousand 
strikes  a  year  for  five  years  in  America,  or  more  than  in 
any  country  in  the  world.  If  we  seek  the  cause  we  may 
turn  for  an  official  answer  to  the  Final  Report  of  the  Com¬ 
mission  on  Industrial  Relations:  “The  sources  from  which 
this  unrest  springs  group  themselves  without  exception 
under  four  main  sources  which  include  all  the  others: 

1.  Unjust  distribution  of  wealth  and  income. 

2.  Unemployment  and  denial  of  an  opportunity  to  earn 
a  living. 

3.  Denial  of  justice  in  the  creation,  adjudication  and  in 
the  administration  of  law. 

4.  Denial  of  the  right  and  opportunity  to  form  effective 
organizations.”1 

At  the  moment  of  writing  we  are  on  a  tide  of  prosperity 
in  America  while  most  of  the  world  is  suffering  from  an 
acute  trade  depression.  Secretary  of  Labor  James  J.  Davis, 
in  his  annual  report,  said:  “Less  than  a  year  ago  it  was 
estimated  that  between  five  and  six  million  workers  were 
without  jobs.  We  are  now  back  at  normal  in  our  employ¬ 
ment.  But  we  have  made  the  startling  discovery  that  ‘nor¬ 
mal’  in  America  means  that  approximately  a  million  and  a 
half  workmen  are  detached  from  any  payroll.  Here  we 


1  Reprint  from  Semite  Document  415,  p.  30. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


193 


have  two  problems  to  meet — to  prevent  a  recurrence  of  the 
employment  depression  which  threw  between  five  and  six 
million  men  into  idleness,  and  to  reduce  the  number  of  our 
workingmen  who  are  daily  without  means  of  livelihood.” 

3.  A  third  problem  which  confronts  labor  is  that  of  in¬ 
come,  or  the  question  of  a  living  wage.  If  we  recall  the  sub¬ 
stance  of  previous  chapters,  we  shall  realize  the  long  fight 
stretching  over  centuries  which  labor  has  been  forced  to 
make  against  the  depreciation  and  deterioration  of  its  stand¬ 
ard  of  life.  Sir  Leo  Chiozza  Money  quotes  Robert  Hunter 
on  the  question  of  poverty  in  America,  as  follows:  “There 
are  probably  in  fairly  prosperous  years  no  less  than  10,000,- 
000  persons  in  poverty;  that  is  to  say,  underfed,  under¬ 
clothed,  and  poorly  housed.  Of  these  about  4,000,000  per¬ 
sons  are  public  paupers.  Over  2,000,000  workingmen  are 
unemployed  from  four  to  six  months  in  the  year.  About 
500,000  male  immigrants  arrive  yearly  and  seek  work  in  the 
very  districts  where  unemployment  is  greatest.  Nearly 
half  of  the  families  in  the  country  are  propertyless.  Over 
1,700,000  little  children  are  forced  to  become  wage  earners 
when  they  should  still  be  in  school.  About  5,000,000 
women  find  it  necessary  to  work,  and  about  2,000,000  are 
employed  in  factories,  mills,  etc.  Probably  no  less  than 
1,000,000  workers  are  injured  or  killed  each  year  while 
doing  their  work,  and  about  10,000,000  of  the  persons  now 
living  will,  if  the  present  ratio  is  kept  up,  die  of  the  pre¬ 
ventable  disease,  tuberculosis.”1 

There  are  upwards  of  twenty  million  families  in  the 
United  States,  and  in  approximately  half  of  these  the  head 
of  the  family  received  an  income  of  less  than  $1,500.  Only 
a  few  more  than  five  million  persons  received  as  much  as 
$2,000  during  1918.  The  total  income  in  the  United  States 
provides  an  annual  income  of  $581  per  capita,  or  approxi- 


1  “Riches  and  Poverty,"  pp.  5-6. 


194 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


mately  $2,900  for  each  of  the  twenty-one  million  families. 
But,  of  course,  the  national  income  is  not  divided  equally. 
More  than  254,000  persons  receive  an  income  of  at  least 
$10,000  per  year,  and  upwards  of  842,000  persons  receive 
an  income  of  more  than  $5,000  per  year. 

The  workers  are  reminded  by  Professor  W.  I.  King,  for¬ 
merly  of  the  University  of  Wisconsin,  that  approximately 
2  per  cent  of  the  people  possess  some  60  per  cent  of  the 
wealth  of  the  United  States,  while  65  per  cent,  or  the 
majority  of  the  people,  possess  only  5  per  cent  of  the  wealth. 
That  is,  two  million  people  possess  more  than  the  remaining 
one  hundred  and  more  millions  all  combined.1  The  future 
condition  of  the  world  will  be  determined  economically  and 
politically  by  the  contest  for  power.  The  power  of  the  vote 
is  in  the  hands  of  the  many,  while  the  power  of  capital  is 
in  the  hands  of  the  few,  and  the  incongruity  constantly 
grows  greater. 

Industry  is  in  its  very  nature  co-operative.  So  long  as 
these  problems  are  not  approached  from  the  viewpoint  of 
joint  solutions  unrest  will  be  the  natural  concomitant  of 
industry.  So  long  as  we  continue  to  view  the  industrial 
problem  as  one  in  which  the  workers,  the  employers  and 
the  technicians  are  to  remain  as  separatist,  unintegrated 
groups,  just  so  long  are  we  certain  to  have  a  grave  industrial 
situation.  The  only  alternative  is  to  view  the  workers  as 
machines,  or  “robots,”  who  desire  no  responsibilities  in  the 
conduct  of  industry.  If  the  viewpoint  of  personality,  or 
the  desire  of  every  individual  to  share  in  the  control  of  his 
own  destiny,  is  omitted,  the  problem  remains  one  merely  of 
mechanics,  of  wages,  hours,  and  standards  of  material  liv¬ 
ing.  Once  the  viewpoint  of  personality  is  injected  the  in¬ 
dustrial  problem  comes  to  be  one  of  cultural  and  spiritual 


1  Wealth  and  Income,  W.  I.  King,  pp.  80,  82. 


AMERICAN  LABOR  MOVEMENT 


195 


values.  Without  this  viewpoint  the  industrial  problem 
remains  one  in  which  only  the  lower  strata  of  motives  are 
employed. 

We  shall  take  up  the  question  of  the  final  solution  of 
these  problems  in  the  next  chapter.  Must  we  not  seek  to¬ 
gether  some  common  platform  for  the  reconstruction  of  in¬ 
dustry?  Such  a  platform  must  include  legal,  educational, 
ethical  and  spiritual  measures. 

Legally,  we  must  seek  federal  or  state  legislation  looking 
toward  the  abolition  of  forced  unemployment,  adequate  ac¬ 
cident,  old  age  and  health  insurance.  We  need  a  re-codi¬ 
fication  of  laws  dealing  with  industrial  relations.  We  need 
court  reform  that  will  prevent  five  to  four  decisions  con¬ 
trary  to  the  mature  action  of  Congress  and  the  will  of  the 
people.  We  require  in  America  the  full  and  frank  recog¬ 
nition  of  the  right  of  collective  bargaining. 

Educationally,  we  need  the  provision  of  adult  education 
available  for  all  workers.  We  should  have  education 
dealing  with  the  bases  of  class  prejudice.  This  education 
should  look  forward  to  the  growing  participation  of  the 
workers  in  the  joint  control  of  industry.  The  whole  trend 
of  the  times  is  toward  this  in  more  advanced  industrial 
countries.  Public  welfare,  rather  than  the  monopoly  of 
class  privilege  whether  of  workers  or  employers,  must  be 
the  touchstone  for  the  solution  of  every  problem.  In  speak¬ 
ing  of  the  workers’  share  of  control  on  the  industrial  side 
of  production,  we  are  of  course  not  referring  to  the  monop¬ 
olistic,  autocratic  control  of  ignorant  workers  of  the  fac¬ 
tories  which  proved  so  disastrous  in  both  Russia  and  Italy. 

Ethically,  there  must  be  the  recognition  of  the  fact  that 
industrial  relationships  are  ethical  in  character.  We  need 
to  invent  means  for  evaluating  the  moral  values  involved 
in  industrial  technique.  We  shall  need  also  the  growing 
recognition  by  employers  that  it  is  just  to  expect  them  to 


196 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


bear  the  burden  of  unemployment,  at  least  in  part.  If  only 
five  per  cent  of  the  workers  are  unemployed,  on  average,  it 
would  only  add  five  per  cent  to  the  wage  bill  if  industry 
assumed  the  whole  responsibility  of  unemployment  insure 
ance,  quite  apart  from  any  share  undertaken  by  the  work¬ 
ers  or  by  the  state.  As  Mr.  Rowntree  says,  “We  shall  never 
have  industrial  peace  until  we  find  some  way  of  removing 
the  menace  of  unemployment.” 

Spiritually,  we  all  need  a  deeper  recognition  of  the  value 
of  personality.  Man’s  threefold  life  is  economic,  political 
and  spiritual.  Man  cannot  live  by  bread  alone,  nor  can 
he  be  dominated  by  any  industrial  or  political  tyranny 
that  does  not  develop  and  satisfy  his  soul.  Apart  from 
spiritual  life  the  worker  becomes  a  mere  cog  in  an  in¬ 
dustrial  machine.  Early  craftsmanship  gave  the  worker 
control  over  his  own  life,  personal  freedom  and  a  sense  of 
his  worth  as  a  man.  Our  problem  is  to  recover  this  for  the 
modern  worker  in  our  machine-made  civilization.  Thus 
we  must  include  legal,  educational,  ethical  and  spiritual 
measures  if  we  are  to  solve  our  industrial  problems  which 
are  not  mere  matters  of  wages,  hours  and  material  condi¬ 
tions.  The  final  solution  of  these  problems  we  shall  con¬ 
sider  in  the  closing  chapter. 


Chapter  IX 

THE  CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

Let  us  now  face  the  challenge  which  this  new  world  of 
labor  presents.  As  we  have  seen,  under  slavery  the  whole 
man  was  sold  as  a  commodity.  Under  serfdom  a  large 
portion  of  his  being  remained  a  part  of  the  economic  sys¬ 
tem.  Under  capitalism  a  man’s  labor  power  is  still  often 
a  commodity.  This  also  must  be  redeemed  and  freed.  He 
must  work  not  as  a  cog  in  a  heartless  machine,  not  with 
his  whole  life  dominated  by  a  power  which  takes  no  account 
of  him  as  a  human  being,  but  under  a  system  which  will 
give  him  economic  freedom,  human  justice  and  spiritual 
development.  In  the  light  of  these  three  fundamental  and 
eternal  demands,  our  present  system  must  be  judged  and 
our  plans  for  the  future  formulated. 

In  saying  this  we  are  dealing  not  with  an  idle  theory  but 
with  the  operation  of  a  law  as  certain  and  as  calculable 
as  gravity.  History  repeats  itself,  from  the  strike  of  the 
oppressed  Hebrew  bricklayers  in  Egypt  to  the  volcanic 
upheaval  in  autocratic  Czarist  Russia.  And  yet  in  every 
age,  learning  nothing  and  forgetting  nothing,  a  Bourbon 
class  arises  in  industrial,  political  or  religious  life,  claiming 
a  special  privilege  which  in  the  nature  of  the  case  can  only 
be  enjoyed  by  a  small  minority  at  the  expense  of  the  rights 
of  the  vast  majority.  And  in  every  age,  just  because  it  is 
human  and  cannot  deny  its  God-given  irrepressible  in¬ 
stincts,  that  majority  rises,  organizes  and  claims  its  rights, 
peaceably  if  it  be  under  a  rule  of  liberty,  violently  if  it 

197 


198 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


be  under  a  system  of  repression.  Man  has  at  last  won 
liberty  of  conscience  in  the  religious  sphere,  the  ballot  and 
some  measure  of  democracy  in  the  political  sphere;  he  has 
not  yet  won  industrial  democracy  or  justice  in  his  economic 
life. 

In  Russia  organized  labor  has  won  a  large  measure  of 
economic  freedom,  though  not  yet  economic  prosperity, 
but  without  either  full  political  or  religious  liberty.  The 
majority  are  under  a  frankly  imposed  “temporary  dicta¬ 
torship.”  Russia  will  not  reach  stable  equilibrium,  even 
though  her  government  be  as  strong  as  that  of  the  Czar’s 
for  five  centuries,  until  she  learns  the  lesson  not  only  of 
justice,  equality  and  fraternity  but  also  of  liberty,  democ¬ 
racy  and  spiritual  autonomy. 

In  China  exploited  labor  is  under  the  most  terrible  and 
disgraceful  conditions  in  the  whole  world,  under  a  central 
government  impotent  and  honeycombed  with  bribery  and 
corruption.  Paper  laws  cannot  save  the  “face”  of  China. 
Conditions  there  constitute  a  burning  challenge  to  the 
entire  nation  and  to  every  true  friend  of  that  great  people. 

Japan  has  made  more  rapid  industrial  advance  in  mak¬ 
ing  money  than  she  has  in  solving  the  human  problem  of 
labor.  If  she  continues  to  advance  in  liberalism,  abolishes 
the  dangerous  political  system  of  “dual  government,”  and 
permits  labor  legally  to  organize  to  improve  its  conditions 
in  the  sweated  industries,  she  may  avoid  a  revolution  of 
violence.  No  government  has  shown  a  greater  sagacity  in 
discerning  the  signs  of  the  times  and  in  granting  reforms 
before  it  was  too  late. 

The  nationalists  of  India  have  been  so  absorbed  with 
the  great  problem  of  political  autonomy  that  they  have 
as  yet  given  little  thought  to  industrial  conditions  which, 
however,  represent  an  imperative  need.  The  responsibility 
for  these  conditions  cannot  be  placed  solely  on  the  govern- 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  199 


ment.  By  its  wise  legislation  since  the  Washington  Con¬ 
ference  the  government  has  thus  far  done  more  for  labor 
than  have  the  foreign  or  Indian  employers,  the  students, 
the  intellectuals  or  the  general  public.  The  time  has  come 
when  an  awakened  social  conscience  and  an  intelligent 
public  opinion  must  demand  that  the  workers  of  India 
shall  have  a  living  wage,  a  chance  at  education  and  their 
full  portion  in  “the  good  life.” 

In  Great  Britain,  though  depleted  by  unemployment  for 
four  successive  years  and  acute  trade  depression,  the  bal¬ 
ance  is  somewhat  better  kept  between  liberty  in  the  eco¬ 
nomic,  the  political  and  the  religious  spheres.  There  is  a 
healthy  co-ordination  between  industrial  and  political 
activity,  together  with  the  co-operative  movement  and 
workers’  education.  There  is  a  co-ordination  between  the 
intellectuals  and  labor  that  is  full  of  promise.  There  is  a 
recognition  both  of  material  and  spiritual  interests  on  the 
part  of  many  leaders  that  is  hopeful. 

Labor  on  the  continent  of  Europe,  at  present  weakened 
and  divided,  is  falling  an  easy  prey  before  the  combined 
forces  of  militarism,  imperialism  and  exploiting  capitalism. 
In  Germany  the  political  revolution  which  followed  the 
war  was  halted  to  make  a  coalition  compromise  with  cap¬ 
italism  and  was  absorbed  and  dominated  by  it.  In  France 
the  divided  masses  of  labor  within  the  nation  as  well  as  in 
all  Europe  are  threatened  by  the  ominous  menace  of  am¬ 
bitious  French  militarism  and  imperialism.  We  have  al¬ 
ways  been  unsparing .  in  our  condemnation  of  the  guilt  of 
German  militarism.  And  we  shall  not  be  silent  now  either 
in  the  demand  for  the  revision  of  a  Treaty  which,  in  our 
judgment,  is  as  immoral  as  it  is  impossible  of  fulfillment, 
nor  in  exposing  French  militarism  which  we  have  wit¬ 
nessed  on  the  Rhine  and  in  the  Ruhr,  which  threatens  the 


200  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

peace  of  nations  and  the  welfare  of  the  whole  world  of 
labor. 

All  are  menaced  by  the  forces  of  personal  ambition, 
militarism,  imperialism  and  selfish  capitalism.  The  life  of 
multitudes  must  no  longer  be  lived  nor  history  written  for 
the  personal  vanity  or  greed  of  a  few  nationalists,  im¬ 
perialists  and  industrialists.  Not  for  Poincare,  Mussolini 
or  Stinnes,  any  more  than  for  Romanoffs,  Hapsburgs 
and  Hohenzollerns  does  the  world  exist.  It  is  the  long 
exploited  masses  of  dumb  humanity,  it  is  the  whole  new 
world  of  labor  that  must  come  to  its  own  today.  It  is 
for  us  to  determine  now  whether  that  change  shall  be  ac¬ 
complished  by  evolution  or  revolution,  in  peace  or  with 
violence. 

Let  us  refuse  to  surrender  the  rights  of  our  common 
humanity,  our  ideal  of  an  ultimate  democracy  and  of  our 
spiritual  inheritance.  There  must  be  neither  East  nor 
West,  neither  white  nor  black,  neither  rich  nor  poor,  neither 
privileged  nor  unprivileged,  neither  skilled  nor  unskilled, 
neither  intellectual  nor  illiterate,  no  monopoly  and  no  ex¬ 
clusion,  in  the  common  humanity  of  the  new  world  of 
labor.  In  industry,  in  the  state,  in  spiritual  development, 
we  must  share  life  and  privilege — of  all  the  people,  by  all 
the  people  and  for  all  the  people. 

As  we  trace  the  slow  evolution  of  labor  through  the  long 
centuries  of  the  past,  up  from  slavery,  serfdom  and  poverty, 
we  are  filled  with  new  hope,  and  the  determination  that 
the  same  methods  that  have  achieved  the  measure  of 
emancipation  and  justice  already  won,  must  now  be  ap¬ 
plied  to  win  full  autonomy  in  the  economic  as  well  as  in 
the  political  and  religious  spheres.  The  best  results  have 
been  achieved  when  workers  and  so-called  “intellectuals,” 
the  skilled  and  the  unskilled,  practical  men  of  the  masses 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  201 


and  students  in  the  universities,  employers  and  employees 
have  co-operated  to  achieve  the  ends  of  equal  rights  for 
all.  Men  of  the  latter  class,  the  intellectuals,  the  students, 
the  employers  and  men  of  wealth  have  their  innings  and 
their  opportunity  today.  If  they  are  blind  to  it,  if  they 
defend  the  status  quo,  if  they  say  that  nothing  needs  to  be 
done  and  worship  only  at  the  shrine  of  the  god  of  Things- 
as-they-are,  they  will  have  their  reward.  If  they  frankly 
encourage  labor’s  efforts  at  trade  union  organization,  col¬ 
lective  bargaining  and  the  sharing  of  democratic  control  of 
industry  to  the  extent  of  giving  labor  a  voice  in  deter¬ 
mining  its  working  conditions,  they  co-operate  in  the 
normal  inevitable  evolutionary  advance  of  all  humanity  to 
full  self-determination,  self-expression,  self-realization.  If 
they  refuse  that  right  they  must  not  be  surprised  if  labor 
itself  seeks  the  remedy  in  its  own  way.  The  interests  of 
capital  and  labor  are  not  identical  unless  we  make  them 
so.  The  interests  of  labor  are  not  ours  unless  we  identify 
ourselves  with  them. 

Even  the  most  casual  observer  or  the  most  superficial 
reader  of  the  record  of  these  great  movements  which  have 
been  so  inadequately  described  in  this  brief  volume  must 
realize  that  we  are  facing  today  challenging  industrial 
problems  in  the  world  of  labor.  What  attitude  are  we  to 
take  to  them?  Four  classes  especially  will  have  to  face 
these  problems:  the  employers,  the  workers  themselves,  the 
students  and  the  leaders  of  thought  who  mold  public  opin¬ 
ion,  including  teachers,  editors  and  clergymen. 

First  of  all  the  employers  must  decide  whether  they  are 
to  take  the  attitude  of  co-operation  with  or  of  opposition 
to  organized  labor.  For,  unless  all  history  belies  itself, 
labor  will  organize.  Are  employers  to  deny  to  labor  the 
right  which  they  exercise  themselves?  The  Social  Ideals 
of  the  Protestant  Churches  recognize  “the  right  of  em- 


202 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


ployees  and  employers  alike  to  organize/'  and  the  right 
of  collective  bargaining;  that  is,  the  right  to  organize  labor 
unions  whose  representatives  shall  be  recognized  by  em¬ 
ployers.  The  National  Catholic  Welfare  Council  expresses 
the  hope  that  this  right  “will  never  again  be  called  in 
question."  The  Central  Conference  of  American  Rabbis 
“recognizes  the  right  of  labor  to  organize  and  bargain  col¬ 
lectively  through  representaU  »s  of  its  own  choosing." 

The  equal  right  of  employer  :>d  employee  in  this  regard 
has  been  recognized  by  leading  religious  bodies  in  America 
and  Europe,  and  by  employers  in  nearly  all  countries  in¬ 
dustrially  advanced,  yet  it  is  frequently  denied  in  our  own 
country.  We  have  witnessed  a  nationwide  open-shop 
campaign  under  the  banner  of  “patriotism  and  true  Amer¬ 
icanism."  We  are  not  here  defending  the  evil  methods 
employed  by  some  labor  leaders,  nor  are  we  unmindful  of 
the  wise  practice  of  many  employers  of  dealing  with  or¬ 
ganized  labor,  nor  of  their  earnest  efforts  to  find  a  just 
solution  of  the  labor  problem.  But  even  such  bodies  as 
the  New  Jersey  State  Chamber  of  Commerce  advise  em¬ 
ployers  to  keep  clear  of  the  various  “open  shop"  move¬ 
ments  which  are  “undermining  the  confidence  of  labor  in 
employers,  and  ruining  the  foundation  of  co-operation  be¬ 
tween  them." 

In  backward  sections  of  the  country  like  West  Virginia 
we  have  had  almost  medieval  feudal  conditions  resulting 
in  bloodshed  and  civil  war  because  of  the  denial  of  labor's 
right  to  organize,  as  shown  by  the  report  of  the  investi¬ 
gating  committee  of  the  United  States  Senate.  In  power¬ 
ful  organizations  like  the  United  States  Steel  Corporation 
we  have  had  a  determined  and  successful  effort  to  break 
up  and  exclude  the  unions,  an  effective  use  of  the  industrial 
spy  system,  and  for  many  years  past  the  long  continued 
disgrace  of  a  twelve-hour  day  and  a  seven-day  week  for  a 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  203 


large  proportion  of  the  steel  workers,  in  spite  of  the  grow¬ 
ing  condemnation  of  enlightened  public  opinion.  Only 
within  recent  months  has  the  Corporation  announced  its 
intention  of  abolishing  completely  the  twelve-hour  day 
and  seven-day  week.  The  writer  has  himself  read  reports 
of  spies  intended  for  employers  that  made  his  blood  boil 
with  indignation  and  made  him  wonder  whether  he  was 
in  Czarist  Russia  or  in  America,  “the  land  of  the  free.” 

The  policy  of  organized  labor  in  America  is  also  a  mat¬ 
ter  of  great  moment.  Too  often  trade  unions  have  failed 
to  co-operate  with  employers  in  the  matter  of  efficient  pro¬ 
duction,  and  have  been  unmindful  of  the  interests  of  the 
public.  Sometimes  labor  leaders  have  been  guilty  of 
actually  obstructing  and  limiting  production,  and  in  some 
cases  have  caused  the  financial  failure  of  important  enter¬ 
prises.  In  other  cases  unprincipled  walking  delegates  who 
have  no  concern  in  the  prosperity  of  industry  have  arti¬ 
ficially  stimulated  strife  and  discord  among  the  workers. 
Other  leaders  have  yielded  to  bribery,  have  faithlessly 
broken  contracts,  or  have  resorted  to  intimidation  and 
actual  violence.  Such  men  are  the  workers’  worst  enemies. 
Where  such  evils  exist  organized  labor  must  set  its  own 
house  in  order  before  it  can  claim  the  sympathy  and  co¬ 
operation  of  employers  and  the  public. 

The  American  Labor  Movement  in  numerical  strength 
has  always  been  below  that  of  the  most  advanced  nations 
in  Europe.  Almost  all  the  labor  movements  of  Europe 
have  their  own  political  representatives  in  large  numbers 
in  their  national  legislative  assemblies. 

American  Labor  has  followed  a  policy  of  isolation.  Are 
the  American  trade  unions  to  play  a  worthy  part,  com¬ 
mensurate  with  the  population,  wealth  and  power  of  the 
nation,  in  the  world’s  labor  movement?  Or  are  they  to 
keep  selfishly  aloof  from  the  great  toiling  masses  of  man- 


204 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


kind?  Are  they  to  stand  separate  and  superior,  isolated 
from  the  unskilled,  the  Negro,  the  immigrant,  the  or¬ 
ganized  workers  of  Europe,  the  whole  International  Labor 
Movement — in  short  from  the  whole  new  world  of  labor? 

What  attitude  are  students  to  take  to  American  labor 
problems?  Are  they  to  permit  the  widening  gulf  which 
already  exists  in  so  many  older  countries  between  the  col¬ 
lege  and  labor,  the  educated  and  uneducated,  the  privi¬ 
leged  and  unprivileged?  In  no  country  is  there  normally 
such  a  large  proportion  of  students  democratically  work¬ 
ing  their  way  through  college  who  ought  to  have  contact 
and  sympathy  with  the  world  of  labor.  But  how  many 
students  know  or  care  about  that  real  world  of  toil?  How 
many  are  intelligently  informed  upon  these  crucial  indus¬ 
trial  problems? 

For  illustration,  how  many  of  them  realize  the  sig¬ 
nificance  of  students  acting  as  strikebreakers?  In  not 
one  of  the  score  of  other  industrial  countries  which  the 
writer  has  visited  in  this  last  tour  around  the  world  did  he 
find  students  thoughtlessly  lending  themselves  to  this  prac¬ 
tice.  Yet  in  some  colleges  in  America  strikebreaking  has 
at  times  furnished  a  kind  of  new  “outdoor  sport.”  With¬ 
out  knowing  or  caring  particularly  about  the  moral  issues 
involved,  whether  the  strike  was  for  a  just  cause  or  not, 
students  have  frequently  helped  to  take  bread  from  the 
workers’  mouths  by  offering  themselves  as  “scabs,” 
“blacklegs”  and  strikebreakers.  Students  have  unwittingly 
done  their  bit,  however  small,  to  embitter  labor,  and  to 
bring  one  step  nearer  the  class  war  in  this  country.  The 
more  mature  students  of  Europe  now  know  that  this  class 
war  is  no  outdoor  sport  for  sons  of  privilege.  They  are 
seriously  studying  these  challenging  problems.  The  very 
civilization  of  Europe  is  at  stake  in  the  vast  upheaval  of 
revolutionary  forces  there,  while  in  America  dances, 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  205 


athletics,  exclusive  fraternities  and  a  distracting  and  cheap 
round  of  college  “activities”  absorb  the  life  of  the  majority 
of  students. 

Let  the  individual  American  student  honestly  ask  him¬ 
self  what  is  the  purpose  of  his  own  education.  Is  it  to  fit 
him  to  enter  the  competitive  struggle  as  a  better  money 
maker?  Is  it  better  to  enjoy  life  as  he  inherits  his  father’s 
business?  Is  it  more  intelligently  to  exploit  the  labor  of 
others  to  add  to  his  private  fortune,  or  is  it  to  prepare  him 
for  fuller  life  and  larger  service  for  his  fellow  men,  for  the 
backward  classes,  the  undeveloped  races,  the  needier 
nations  of  humanity? 

Finally  what  is  to  be  the  attitude  of  the  leaders  of 
thought  in  America,  the  makers  of  public  opinion  for  the 
press,  pulpit  and  platform?  Are  they  to  join  that  reaction¬ 
ary  class  who  in  every  age  have  championed  the  cause  of 
the  few  against  the  many,  of  privilege  against  the  masses, 
of  wealth  against  poverty?  Are  they  to  look  upon  this 
inevitable,  ever-repeated  movement  of  labor  to  organize 
and  improve  its  conditions  as  irregular,  unnatural,  dis¬ 
reputable  or  seditious?  Such  unfortunately  has  been  the 
usual  attitude  of  leaders  of  thought  on  the  great  historical 
moral  issues  between  privilege  and  justice. 

This  attitude  is  natural  because  the  contacts  of  these 
leaders  are  usually  closer  and  their  interests  are  more  in 
common  with  men  of  wealth.  Moreover,  the  chief  sources 
of  information  are  more  often  controlled  by  men  of  this 
group.  Furthermore  the  excesses  of  labor  are  more  obvious 
and  subject  the  public  to  more  apparent  inconvenience  than 
exploitation  by  employers.  Yet  the  pervasive  influence  of 
the  great  corporations  and  the  domination  of  the  money 
power  in  America  over  industry,  politics,  education  and 
religion  is  a  far  greater  menace  to  public  welfare  than  the 
more  obvious  shortcomings  of  organized  labor. 


206 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


There  is  one  thing  common  to  all  the  four  classes  men¬ 
tioned  above  that  must  determine  their  attitude  to  these 
industrial  problems,  whether  employers,  workers,  students 
or  makers  of  public  opinion.  All  are  forced  to  make  one 
supreme  decision.  Their  final  attitude  to  these  labor  prob¬ 
lems  and  their  ultimate  interpretation  of  life  must  be  either 
material  or  spiritual.  The  consistent  Christian  and  the 
Russian  Communist  agree  in  this,  that  “no  man  can  serve 
two  masters” ;  he  cannot  be  true  both  to  God  and  mammon. 
He  must  choose  between  a  material  and  a  spiritual  inter¬ 
pretation  of  life.  Is  the  thoroughgoing  materialistic  inter¬ 
pretation  of  history  by  economic  determinism,  or  the  spirit¬ 
ual  interpretation  of  life  valid?  There  seems  to  be  no 
escape  from  this  final  alternative. 

Of  those  who  honestly  choose  the  former  there  are  three 
classes.  The  materialistic  Marxian  Socialist  who  advocates 
the  class  war  and  the  dictatorship  of  the  proletariat,  the 
materialistic  militarist  who  advocates  imperialism  and 
national  exploitation  of  conquered  nations  by  force,  and 
the  materialistic  industrialist  dominated  solely  by  the 
motive  of  self-interest,  whether  he  be  an  employer  or  a 
worker.  All  three  are  equally  pagan  and  un-Christian. 
Though  they  hate  each  other,  logically  all  belong  to  the 
same  class — the  Communist,  the  militarist,  the  merciless 
employer  and  the  self-seeking  labor  leader  are  all  of  a  kind 
in  their  materialistic  interpretation  of  life  and  in  the  inevi¬ 
table  results  to  which  this  interpretation  leads. 

The  logical  and  inevitable  result  for  all  three  classes  is 
war,  class  war,  international  war,  industrial  war.  And 
“war  is  hell.”  The  whole  community  and  the  whole  of 
humanity  suffer  today  from  industrial,  international  and 
inter-racial  war  based  upon  selfish  greed  and  hate. 

Upon  this  recent  trip  the  writer  found  an  increasing  num¬ 
ber  of  the  leading  statesmen  of  Europe  agreeing  that  an- 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  207 


other  great  war  would  mean  the  break-up  of  civilization  in 
Europe.  The  outlook  in  that  war-torn  continent  is  alarm¬ 
ing  if  not  desperate.  Is  there  any  solution? 

For  himself  the  writer  is  driven  for  a  solution  to  the 
other  alternative — the  spiritual  interpretation  of  life.  This 
may  be  defined  in  philosophical,  esthetic,  moral  or  religious 
terms.  But  the  world’s  need  is  so  desperate  that  we  must 
seek  at  the  heart  of  life  a  moral  and  spiritual  dynamic  ade¬ 
quate  to  the  whole  world’s  need.  Is  there  such? 

Nineteen  centuries  ago  a  Galilean  carpenter  in  an 
obscure  province  of  the  Roman  Empire  of  blood  and  iron 
and  gold  hurled  into  a  warring  world  a  message  of  Good 
News.  He  proclaimed  a  new  social  order  which  he  called 
the  Kingdom  of  God  on  earth.  With  bold,  concrete  prac¬ 
tical  idealism  he  interpreted  life  as  ultimately  personal  and 
spiritual.  He  did  not  believe  in  an  unexplained  and  sordid 
world  merely  of  matter  and  force,  nor  in  a  brute  struggle 
for  existence,  resulting  in  the  survival  of  the  fittest  to  fight. 
He  did  not  advocate  a  class  war  motivated  by  hate,  the 
dictatorship  of  one  class,  however  large  or  needy,  based 
upon  the  compulsion  of  armed  force  and  a  terror,  red  or 
white.  He  was  not  concerned  with  economic  “surplus 
values”  but  with  human  values. 

For  him  all  life  derives  its  meaning  and  power  from  its 
source,  and  that  source  is  not  matter  but  spirit,  not  hate 
but  love,  not  man  but  God.  In  him  we  live  and  move  and 
have  our  being,  so  that  all  life  is  of  infinite  worth,  with 
eternal  possibilities. 

Life  to  him  was  not  a  sordid  scramble  for  wealth  and 
power.  It  was  not  a  rushing  distraction,  a  fiercely  com¬ 
peting  conflict  of  hate.  It  gained  repose  because  unmov- 
ably  centered  in  a  single  principle — love.  Love  meant  the 
full  sharing  of  life,  in  limitless  self-giving  and  self-sacrifice, 
for  the  building  of  a  new  social  order  which  was  at  once 


208 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


“the  commonweal  of  God”  and  a  brotherhood  of  co-operant 
goodwill.  And  this  new  humanity,  this  practical  ideal  of  a 
social  order  which  was  at  the  same  time  a  Kingdom  of  God 
and  a  democracy  of  free  men,  was  gloriously  possible.  It 
was  worth  living  and  dying  for. 

How  was  it  to  be  attained?  His  little,  growing  group  of 
followers  and  friends  were  just  to  love — to  share  their  life 
in  its  overflowing  fulness  with  all  in  want,  especially  with 
the  weary  and  heavy  laden,  the  exploited  masses  of  the 
poor.  They  were  to  share  their  life  with  God,  as  a  real  and 
personal  Father — for  the  infinite  was  Personal  and  incar¬ 
nate  in  every  hopeless,  sweating  toiler,  as  well  as  in  the 
one  supreme  revelation  of  self-sacrificing  and  crucified 
Love.  And  they  were  to  share  their  life  to  the  full  with 
their  needy  fellow  men.  Just  to  love  God  and  their  neigh¬ 
bor  as  a  brother  man.  Those  who  professed  to  be  his  fol¬ 
lowers  were  to  seek  no  selfish  accumulation  of  hoarded 
wealth.  Instead  they  were  to  love,  not  in  idle  sentiment, 
but  to  share  with  those  who  were  hungry,  thirsty,  naked, 
sick  or  in  prison — the  least  of  his  brother  men.  They  were 
to  go  out  as  the  good  Samaritans  of  bruised  and  exploited 
humanity  to  heal  its  wounds  and  redeem  its  life.  They 
were  to  rely  not  on  wealth  and  armament  but  on  the  mighty 
dynamic  of  the  moral  and  spiritual  forces,  the  ultimate 
power  behind  the  universe. 

And  if  they  did  this,  if  men  would  live  this  life  of  love, 
they  would  see  this  Kingdom  of  a  new  social  order  come 
on  this  earth,  where  God’s  will  was  meant  to  be  done  as 
in  heaven.  This  was  Jesus’  way  of  life.  This  was  what 
it  meant  to  be  a  simple  Christian. 

And  straightway  his  followers  went  forth  to  conquer  a 
world.  Where  they  followed  his  way  of  life  they  achieved 
his  victory.  But  many  forgot  his  way  and  took  their  own. 
The  little  indomitable  band  of  militant  love  became  in  time 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  209 


a  vast  and  vested  hierarchy  of  wealth  and  worldly  power. 
Popes,  priests,  monks,  kings  and  politicians  wore  his 
emblem  of  sacrifice  and  shame  as  a  graceful  armament. 
They  built  him  cathedrals  of  costly  stone  and  stained  glass, 
instead  of  a  social  structure  of  a  redeemed  humanity.  They 
gave  their  alms  and  “charity,”  but  not  justice  and  mercy 
to  the  least  of  these  his  brethren.  They  made  ikons  and 
images,  hard  and  fast  ecumenical  creeds  and  Protestant 
dogmas,  they  offered  him  faith  and  works,  the  gifts  of  their 
superfluous  wealth,  the  profession  of  faultless  orthodoxy,  or 
even  at  times  the  zealous  persecution  of  heretics  and  free 
thinkers  when  permitted  by  the  secular  state.  They  fought 
his  battles  with  the  sword,  compassed  sea  and  land  to  make 
proselytes  to  sectarian  religion;  they  worshipped  him;  they 
gave  their  bodies  to  be  burned  in  his  cause.  But  the  one 
thing  needful  they  often  forgot — Love,  the  full  sharing  of 
life  here  and  now  with  their  fellow  meft. 

True,  though  they  did  not  share  their  goods  with  the 
poor  in  this  present  world,  they  promised  them  the  satis¬ 
faction  of  future  bliss  in  heaven,  in  lieu  of  justice  and 
mercy  and  life  abundant  here  on  earth.  They  achieved 
much  for  themselves  in  a  personal,  possessive  salvation. 
They  sang,  “Oh,  that  will  be,  glory  for  me,  for  me,  for  me/” 
But  it  became  in  time  quite  unorthodox  to  speak  of  the 
social  application  of  his  way  of  life  to  such  practical  mat¬ 
ters  as  labor,  industry  and  politics,  or  of  the  application  of 
his  teaching  to  their  accumulated  property. 

And  for  all  this  they  received  their  reward.  His  fol¬ 
lowers  in  Protestant  countries  belonged  increasingly  to  a 
prosperous  middle  class.  They  were  frugal;  they  made 
money ;  they  passed  legislation  to  protect  their  vested  inter¬ 
ests.  Gradually  the  laboring  masses,  the  weary  and  heavy 
laden  to  whom  the  Galilean  Jesus  had  preached,  drew  apart. 
They  became  “this  multitude  that  knoweth  not  the  law 


210 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


that  is  accursed”;  fiercely  blamed  for  their  irreligion,  their 
atheism,  their  Bolshevism — a  great  mass  often  Marxian 
and  materialistic  and  finally  hardened  and  embittered. 
God  knows  the  writer  would  not  make  light  of  true  religion 
in  which  he  passionately  believes,  and  of  which  there  is 
much  in  the  world  today.  He  believes  in  vital,  personal 
religion  not  only,  but  in  necessary  organization  in  all 
departments  of  life,  including  the  Church  as  the  organic, 
social  expression  of  religion.1 

But  the  masses  could  not  seem  to  believe  in  a  future 
heaven  promised  by  a  prosperous  class  which  did  not  prac¬ 
tice  their  professed  creed  here  on  earth.  So  they  tried  to 
form  a  gospel  of  their  own.  They,  too,  sought  to  build  a 
new  social  order  of  brotherhood.  They  incorporated  in 
their  programmes  and  constitutions  many  of  the  principles 
of  the  spiritual  social  order,  but  they  built  it  on  force  rather 
than  on  freedom,  on  a  class  rather  than  on  an  all-inclusive 
brotherhood,  and  mindful  of  their  lot  and  the  treatment 
they  had  received,  sometimes  on  hatred  rather  than  on  love. 
But  it  was  a  gospel  of  a  sort,  for  it  was  tangible,  concrete, 
immediate,  challenging;  something  here  and  now  for  this 
earth,  for  which  they  were  willing  to  die,  as  they  would 
have  done  for  the  spiritual  gospel  had  they  seen  it  lived 
and  practiced  as  Jesus  did. 

Here  was  a  body  of  labor  lacking  only  a  spiritual  soul; 
and  there  was  the  Church  with  a  soul  but  no  body  of  social 
expression.  They  represented  two  incomplete  and  comple¬ 
mentary  fragments  of  one  common  humanity,  and  they 
needed  each  other.  The  Church  needed  to  be  socialized; 
labor  needed  to  be  spiritualized,  or  concretely,  Christianized. 

Here  is  the  challenge  today  for  a  new  world  of  labor. 
Labor  has  issued  the  call,  “Workers  of  the  world,  unite!” 
Yes,  they  will,  they  must  unite;  they  already  are  uniting. 


1  His  position  in  this  matter  is  stated  in  “Facing  the  Crisis,”  pp.  203-231. 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  211 


But  for  what?  For  a  class  war,  a  dictatorship,  a  terror,  a 
revolution?  Most  certainly  if  we  drive  them  to  it  and  if 
there  is  nothing  left  for  them  but  that. 

But  there  is  one  way  left.  Why  not  try  Jesus’  way  of 
life?  Why  not  share  our  whole  life,  economic,  political, 
spiritual,  in  “creation’s  final  law” — the  law  of  Love?  The 
Church  needs  the  new  world  of  labor,  and  labor  needs  the 
sharing  to  the  full  of  the  whole  life  of  the  spirit.  The  issue 
is  drawn.  It  cannot  be  evaded. 

Vividly  here  in  mid-Atlantic  the  writer  recalls  the  con¬ 
trast  and  challenge  of  a  scene  recently  witnessed  in  Moscow. 
Just  at  the  entrance  to  the  Kremlin,  which  is  the  heart  of 
Russia,  the  home  of  the  Czars,  the  historic  citadel  of  church 
and  state,  there  stands  the  most  sacred  shrine  in  all  the 
Russias,  that  of  the  Iberian  Virgin.  Worshippers  from  all 
parts  of  the  land,  simple  peasants  and  devout  women,  night 
and  day  stand  praying  at  this  shrine,  seeking  its  traditional 
blessings  of  healing.  Just  beside  it,  on  the  wall  facing  this 
chapel,  the  Communist  Party  or  Soviet  Government  has 
placed  without  comment  the  familiar  inscription  from  Karl 
Marx,  “Religion  the  opium  of  the  people.” 

This  shrine  and  this  inscription  represent  the  two  forces 
that  are  today  contending  for  Russia  and  the  world — God 
and  mammon,  the  spiritual  and  the  carnal,  vital  religion 
and  materialistic  atheism,  Love  and  Hate. 

Let  us  make  no  mistake  about  the  forces  behind  these 
two.  Both  are  powerful.  Behind  that  inscription  stands 
the  frank  determination  of  the  most  enduring  cabinet 
in  Europe  today  to  root  out,  by  all  fair  means  without  force, 
that  religion  which  they  regard  as  pure  superstition.  Be¬ 
hind  it  are  vast  masses  of  labor  in  many  lands,  growingly 
class-conscious,  disillusioned — socialist,  communist,  syndi¬ 
calist,  anarchist,  revolutionary  or  reformist — but  prevail¬ 
ingly  apathetic  or  antagonistic  to  religion. 


212  THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 

Behind  that  shrine,  that  ikon  and  image,  are — what? 
The  organized  Churches  of  the  world,  Greek,  Roman  and 
Protestant.  Are  they  prepared  for  this  struggle?  Are  they 
fit  to  survive  just  as  they  are?  Observe  the  superstition 
of  many  of  these  worshippers  at  this  typical  shrine,  as  they 
pay  for  their  prayers,  rely  upon  these  holy  relics,  bow  and 
cross  themselves  with  touching  devotion.  The  Greek 
Orthodox  Church  desperately  needs  a  thorough  reformation. 
Let  us  admit  the  superior  power  and  prestige  of  the  Roman 
hierarchy,  its  wealth,  political  influence,  sagacious  diplo¬ 
macy  along  with  much  true  piety  and  spiritual  vitality. 
But  is  this  Church  reformed  and  ready  for  this  task?  Has 
it  come  to  terms  with  modern  science,  with  the  democratic 
demand  for  separation  of  Church  and  State,  and  with  the 
spiritual  needs  of  the  world  of  labor?  Or,  consider  the 
divided  sects  and  competing  denominations  of  Protestant¬ 
ism.  How  many  of  these  evangelical  Christians  are  preach¬ 
ing  and  practicing  Jesus’  simple  way  of  life?  Have  they 
won  the  masses  of  labor?  Have  they  even  seriously  sought 
to  win  them?  Have  they  a  living  message  of  Good  News 
both  personal  and  social  that  transforms  the  individual  and 
society?  Are  they  living  a  life  that  humanizes,  socializes 
and  Christianizes  industry  and  politics? 

Have  we  all  together  faced  this  challenge  of  Religion 
as  the  “opium  of  the  people”?  Is  there  any  measure  of 
truth  in  the  assertion?  Jesus’  way  of  life  was  revolution¬ 
ary,  thoroughgoing,  transforming.  It  meant  crucifixion, 
resurrection,  a  new  socialized  and  spiritualized  community 
that  had  all  things  common,  not  in  the  prosaic  literalism 
of  legal  compulsion,  but  in  the  communal  life  dominated 
by  the  one  master  passion  of  love.  They  actually  did 
share  the  life  of  God  and  man,  of  rich  and  poor,  “from 
each  according  to  his  ability,  to  each  according  to  his 
need.” 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  213 


But  have  not  our  later  adaptations  and  compromises 
of  religion  often  proved  an  orthodox  opiate  and  sedative, 
content  to  worship  at  the  shrine  of  the  known  god  of 
Things-as-they-are,  not  a  revolutionary  challenge  to  seek 
the  new  social  order  of  things-as-they-ought-to-be?  For 
illustration,  when  the  writer  was  in  Japan,  he  found  a 
common  practice  of  the  managers  of  certain  factories  of 
calling  in  the  ministers  of  religion,  usually  Buddhist  but 
sometimes  Christian,  to  talk  to  the  workers  and  keep 
them  contented,  in  order  to  increase  production. 

In  one  city  the  keeper  of  a  brothel  asked  an  earnest 
missionary  to  talk  to  the  inmates.  The  missionary  ac¬ 
cepted  the  invitation  just  as  he  would  have  done  to  any 
prison  or  other  institution  of  need.  The  keeper  was  pro¬ 
fuse  in  his  gratitude  after  the  address,  providing  tea  and 
cake.  “But  why/’  asked  the  missionary,  “do>  you  wish  me 
to  help  these  poor  creatures  while  you  treat  them  as  you 
do?”  “Oh,”  said  the  brothel  keeper,  “they  are  getting 
‘dangerous  thoughts'  these  days,  they  are  no  longer  con¬ 
tented  with  their  lot.”  He  was  quite  willing  for  a  per¬ 
sonal  application  of  religion  for  a  future  life,  provided  there 
was  no  social  application  to  conditions  in  this;  quite  will¬ 
ing  to  have  their  souls  saved  provided  their  bodies  were 
not.  This  man  conceived  of  religion  as  an  opiate  of  con¬ 
tentment  for  the  status  quo,  not  a  revolutionary  chal¬ 
lenge  to  change  conditions.  The  illustration  was  an  ex¬ 
treme  case  but  typical  of  a  common  misconception  of 
religion. 

After  the  American  colonies  had  been  driven  to  revolu¬ 
tion,  King  George  III  issued  a  proclamation  calling  a  fast 
through  tout  the  churches  of  England  to  atone  for  the  sins 
of  the  rebellious  colonists.  On  this  occasion  scores  of  ser¬ 
mons  were  preached  by  eminent  clergymen  upholding  the 
divine  right  of  kings,  and  upbraiding  the  revolutionists  for 


214. 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


their  disloyalty  and  ingratitude.  To  them  religion  was  a 
respectable  convention,  a  comfortable  sedative,  a  quieting 
opiate  to  subdue  revolutionary  discontent,  and  uphold  the 
vested  interests  of  Church  and  State. 

In  1793,  Paley  showed  to  his  own  satisfaction  that  there 
was  scarcely  any  respect  in  which  the  poor  were  not  more 
fortunate  than  the  rich.  “Some  of  the  necessities  which 
poverty  imposes  are  not  hardships  but  pleasures.  Frugal¬ 
ity  itself  is  a  pleasure.  It  is  an  exercise  of  attention  and 
contrivance,  which,  whenever  it  is  successful,  produces  sat¬ 
isfaction.  The  very  care  and  forecast  that  are  necessary 
to  keep  expenses  and  earning  upon  a  level,  form,  when 
not  embarrassed  by  too  great  difficulties,  an  agreeable  en¬ 
gagement  of  the  thoughts.  This  is  lost  amidst  abundance. 
A  yet  more  serious  advantage  which  persons  in  inferior  sta¬ 
tions  possess,  is  the  ease  with  which  they  provide  for  their 
children.  All  the  provision  which  a  poor  man’s  child  re¬ 
quires  is  contained  in  two  words,  ‘industry  and  innocence/ 
With  these  qualities,  though  without  a  shilling  to  set  him 
forwards,  he  goes  into  the  world  prepared  to  become  a 
useful,  virtuous  and  happy  man.”1 

“Happy  man!”  ah  thrice  happy  if  he  has  partaken  plenti¬ 
fully  enough  of  this  opium  of  the  people,  of  a  personal 
possessive  and  exclusive  religion  which  preaches  content¬ 
ment  to  others,  while  it  refuses  to  share  its  own  well- 
hoarded  store. 

When  the  suffering  and  starving  workers  of  England 
were  driven  to  revolt  in  1830,  under  the  inhuman  condi¬ 
tions  described  in  Chapter  V  many  were  shot  down  by  the 
soldiers,  the  jails  were  filled,  and  four  hundred  and  fifty 
men  forefeited  their  freedom  for  life.  When  law  and 
order  was  restored  the  thankful  Privy  Council  asked  the 
Archbishop  to  prepare  a  form  of  thinksgiving  and  prayer 


1  Hammond’s  “The  Town  Laborer,”  p.  233. 


CHALLENGE  OF  A  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR  215 


which  read:  “Defeat  and  frustrate  the  malice  of  wicked 
and  turbulent  men,  and  turn  their  hearts;  have  pity,  0 
Lord,  on  the  simple  and  ignorant,  who  have  been  led 
astray,  and  recall  them  to  a  sense  of  their  duty.” 

When  slavery  was  a  part  of  the  established  order,  for 
centuries  it  received  the  hearty  support  of  most  of  the 
churches.  For  example,  in  1853  a  typical  sermon  was 
printed  entitled  “Plain  Sermons  for  Servants”  to  keep  the 
slaves  contented,  with  an  introduction  by  Bishop  Meade. 
The  following  is  typical  of  the  teaching  of  the  day:  “You 
should  remember  that  God  has  placed  you  where  you  are. 
God  knows  better  than  you  do  whether  it  is  best  for  you  to 
be  rich  or  poor,  high  or  low,  in  bondage  or  in  liberty.  Had 
He  left  you  to  choose  your  state  in  life  for  yourself,  you 
might  have  made  a  choice  that  would  ruin  you  forever!  .  .  . 
Jesus  Christ  came  especially  to  save  you  from  your  sins.” 
The  last  typical  sermon  in  this  volume  is  entitled,  “The 
Faithful  Christian  Shall  Wear  a  Crown.”  The  opiate  is, 
contentment  in  slavery  here — a  crown  hereafter! 

These  men  were  not  conscious  hypocrites.  They  were 
the  typical  religious  leaders  of  their  day.  They  were 
simply  blinded  by  tradition  and  self-interest.  Are  the 
people  of  this  generation  subject  to  similar  temptations? 
Are  there  equally  earnest  and  sincere  men  today  among 
employers  and  leaders  of  thought  who  all  unconsciously 
are  using  their  privilege  and  power  to  support  “things-as- 
they-are”  and  to  brand  as  revolutionary  every  effort  to 
make  “things-as-they-ought-to-be”?  Are  they  giving  the 
workers  reason  to  regard  religion  as  the  opium  of  the  peo¬ 
ple,  rather  than  what  it  was  to  Jesus,  a  constructive  revolu¬ 
tionary  force  for  the  building  of  a  new  world? 

One  and  all  we  stand  today  before  this  final  challenge, 
this  ultimate  choice.  Are  we  to  follow  God  or  mammon? 
The  choice  is  not  a  matter  of  course,  a  mere  matter  of 


216 


THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR 


profession  or  creed,  of  lip  service,  to  a  Master  whose  way 
of  life  we  crucify  and  reject.  “Mammon”  is  not  a  poetical 
scripture  allusion,  it  means  money,  our  money,  a  selfish 
way  of  living,  a  materialistic  interpretation  of  life.  It 
may  be  the  frankly  confessed  way  of  the  Marxian  Com¬ 
munist,  the  secretly  veiled  way  of  the  militarist,  the  re¬ 
spectable  and  prosperous  way  of  the  selfish  capitalist,  the 
equally  selfish  way  of  the  labor  leader  who  is  out  for  his 
own  gain  rather  than  the  cause  of  his  comrades,  or  it  may 
be  the  consciously  or  unconsciously  hypocritical  way  of 
the  religionist  who  professes  Jesus’  way  of  life  while  he 
denies  it  in  practice  and  makes  religion  “a  spitting  and  a 
byeword”  to  the  masses  now  in  open  rebellion. 

Let  us  get  beyond  profession  to  practice.  How  far  do 
we  actually  live  the  life  of  love,  measured  by  what  we 
share?  In  the  ranks  of  those  frankly  pagan  materialists 
are  men  who  have  taken  up  their  cross  of  long  years  in 
prison  for  their  fellow  men,  and  for  a  better  social  order. 
What  have  we  suffered  for  Jesus’  way  of  life?  How  much 
of  the  spiritual,  the  social  and  the  sacrificial  does  the  world 
of  labor  see  in  our  manner  of  life  and  in  our  measure  of 
sharing  it? 

Let  us  finally  face  the  challenge  and  let  us  make  the 
choice  between  a  materialistic  and  a  spiritual  interpretation 
of  life.  What  is  that  decision  to  be?  Shall  it  not  be  that 
one  and  all,  employers,  workers  by  hand  or  brain,  students 
and  leaders  of  thought,  we  may  work  together,  not  for  our 
class,  small  or  large,  privileged  or  unprivileged,  propertied 
or  proletarian,  but  for  the  common  undivided  humanity  of 
one  world  of  brother  men,  for  the  new  world  of  laborf 


LIGHT  UPON  ECONOMIC  AND  INTERNATIONAL 

PROBLEMS 

1.  the  new  world  of  labor,  by  Sherwood  Eddy.  The  result 
of  investigation  in  ten  principal  industrial  countries  during  a  four¬ 
teen  months  tour  in  Europe  and  Asia.  Considers  labor  conditions 
and  problems  in  China,  Japan,  India,  Russia,  the  continent  of 
Europe  and  America.  220  pages,  cloth  $1.50. 

2.  facing  the  crisis,  by  Sherwood  Eddy.  The  Fondren  Lec¬ 
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4.  Christ  or  mars,  by  Will  Irwin.  An  extraordinarily  vivid 
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5.  CHRISTIANITY  AND  ECONOMIC  PROBLEMS,  a  DisCUSSion-GrOUp 
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Page,  Editor.  Facts,  Principles,  Programs.  An  invaluable  refer¬ 
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6.  the  church  and  industrial  reconstruction,  by  the  Com¬ 
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9.  AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  THE  STUDY  OF  LABOR  PROBLEMS,  by 

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toward  the  understanding  of  jesus,  by  Professor  V.  G.  Sim- 
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